


Slip of the Tongue

by ElinorR



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Book 7: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Dirty Talk, F/M, Hair-pulling, Hand Jobs, Happy Ending, Kissing, Loss of Virginity, Mutual Masturbation, Mutual Pining, Nipple Play, Oral Sex, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Period Sex, Post-Hogwarts, Ron likes Hermione’s bossy voice, Smut, Some Fluff, Some Plot, Tent Sex, Vaginal Fingering, Vaginal Sex, Way more angst than I intended, but who wouldn’t?, canon compliant if we assume Harry just didn't notice what was happening
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-01
Updated: 2019-06-08
Packaged: 2020-04-06 06:07:05
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 22,817
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19056751
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElinorR/pseuds/ElinorR
Summary: Life in the tent is taking its toll on everyone. Ron lets something slip in his complaining that he decidedly did not want Hermione to hear. Her response is...not what he expected.





	1. Let's Pretend I Didn't Say That

As Ron continued whining, Harry considered hexing him. Nothing serious, just something to make Ron shut up. Yes, they hadn’t eaten much the last day, yes, they were making no progress, and yes, Ron was wearing the locket, but still, he didn’t need to complain that much, did he? It wasn’t as if Harry was having a better time than Ron was.

Harry tried to tune him out. The phrases “starving,” “wasting away,” and “if I have to eat another fucking mushroom” popped up frequently, along with a lot of creative and graphic swearing. Ron had already needled Harry about his plans for finding the rest of the Horcruxes and destroying the one they had, despite obviously having no new information. Wound up, Ron then launched into a general list of any and every irritation he could think of. Harry could not wait for Hermione to come back from her turn on watch.

“There’s not even any bloody privacy,” Ron ranted. “Can’t even have a decent  _ wank! _ ”

It was at this moment, exactly as Ron shouted “wank,” that he saw Hermione had entered the tent.

She looked pink, Ron looked scarlet, and Harry rushed out muttering about starting watch without a backwards glance at either of them.

Ron flopped back on his bunk and covered his face with a pillow. He hoped she’d ignore his comment. Maybe they’d both pretend he’d been saying something else entirely and it had simply come out wrong.

This is not what happened.

“You’re not the only one who’s, ehm, frustrated, Ron,” Hermione said. “We have to make the best of it. We could all try to give each other a bit of time alone on occasion, if that would help.”

“Right, I should look on the bright side. Thanks to this conversation at least I get to die of embarrassment,” he said, still under the pillow.

“I don’t know why you’re embarrassed talking to me about it when you were shouting about it to Harry.”

“Harry’s a  _ bloke _ .”

She scoffed. “Oh, I didn’t realize only boys have sexual frustrations. Shocking though it may be to you, girls also masturbate, or wish they had a moment alone so they could!”

He groaned. “Can we shut up about it? I’m not being sexist, I just don’t want to talk about wanking with you.”

“Why not?” she snapped.

“Why not?” He threw the pillow aside. “Are you serious? Because I bloody don’t!”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “That’s very silly, Ronald.”

“It’s silly not to talk to you about wanking? You’re being mental.”

“You might find it interesting,” she said, her voice high.

He closed his eyes and tried to calm himself down. He couldn’t bear it, her thinking of him as such a thoroughly platonic friend that she’d casually chat about wanking with him. He couldn’t imagine a girl who’d talk like that with a man--a boy--who she thought of as a romantic prospect. It was crushing him and it was only his genuine affection for her that kept him from throwing a proper fit. “I don’t want to talk about it,” he said through gritted teeth.

She harrumphed dramatically and began climbing up to her bunk.

“What is there to talk about anyway?” he snarled. “You want to compare techniques?”

“Maybe!” she shouted. “Maybe you’d like to know what I think about!”

“Why would I want to hear that?” he shouted back. He already knew: her fantasies about Krum, or worse, about Harry. She wanted a sympathetic ear about her crushes. Who better to provide that than her dear friend Ron? Her friend who she would never in a million years consider as anything more than that. He’d been deluding himself hoping otherwise.

She shot him a furious, frustrated look and made another angry sort of noise before flinging herself into her bunk. She thrashed around in her bed in a way that suggested she was far from falling asleep but all the same she told Ron to extinguish the lights, which he did without a word. They lay there in the darkness, both irritated and unsure how to do anything about it.

Hermione regretted saying anything, though at least he hadn’t asked her for details. Thankfully, he was ignoring her provocation. She hadn’t been thinking. It had seemed to her for a brief moment like this could be an opening to spell it out for him once and for all. But then again, he had to know already. She’d made her interest clear enough and he still hadn’t made a move in all this time. There were no two ways about it: he wasn’t interested in her. She needed to stop reading into the moments of tenderness. She needed to stop thinking about it.

A few feet away, Ron was also trying to stop his mind from going where it wanted to go. For the last few hours that he’d been wearing the locket Ron’s head had been filled with horrible thoughts, a relentless stream of them, and yet this was worse. Hermione was actually mad at him for not wanting to listen to her talk about this. Of course she’d think of him as essentially a sexless loser, who wouldn’t? He was pathetic. The only girl who’d ever wanted him was fucking Lavender, a person he did not especially like, and who seemed as interested as having the idea of a boyfriend as in him personally. That was as good as it was ever going to be him.

He needed to stop thinking about Hermione. It was never going to happen. Maybe if he heard her talk about what she really wanted, he’d finally get over her. It would hurt but at least he’d stop pining away like an idiot.

He took a deep breath. “Hermione,” he said softly, bracing himself for the punishing words he knew would follow. “What do you think about?”

She startled in her bunk. She considered snapping at him to avoid the vulnerability of her answer, but, no, what good would come of more fighting? It wasn’t like they could avoid each other. They might die at any minute. She ought to be brave, even if nothing ever came of it. She was so sick of waiting. “Promise you won’t laugh,” she said, barely above a whisper.

Ron knew that meant it was definitely going to be about Harry. “I won’t laugh,” he said, hoping he also wouldn’t cry.

“You.”

“Me?”

“I don’t know why you sound so shocked. Yes, you.”

“Oh.”

She buried her face in her pillow. She tried to think of a time she’d felt this deep a shame.

“Hermione?”

“Yes, Ron?” She forced her voice to sound steady.

“I think about you too.”

“Really?” Hope swelled in her heart.

“Always.”

“Always?”

“Well,” he amended. “You always make an appearance at least.”

“I  _ make an appearance?” _ she growled.

“Sometimes it’s you and other girls fighting over me, ripping each other’s clothes to bits, and I say--”

Hermione burst out laughing.

“I thought there was no laughing,” Ron said, stung.

“I asked you not to laugh when I was telling you I liked you. Then you tell me you think about me as part of your harem and my clothes being destroyed!” She was still laughing. “I’m either going to laugh or curse you.”

“It’s not like that,” he said defensively. “It’s not a harem. A lot of the time it’s only you. No matter what else I think about, I think about you every time.”

She smiled a little in the dark. “I suppose that’s rather sweet in a way.”

“You don’t mind then? That I think about you?”

“I think about you too, remember?”

“Oh, right.” He felt unable to make sense of this. “Hermione? When you’re thinking about me, what I am doing?”

Her face felt hot. “You kiss me for a start. Then...I pretend my hands are your hands. I imagine you doing to me whatever I’m doing to myself.”

“That sounds very good,” he said, sounding slightly strangled. “I like that.”

“What do you think about, when you think about me?”

“Loads of things. You at the Yule Ball, grabbing you and pulling you away from Krum, kissing you and getting you out of that dress. Or the same thing at the wedding, kissing you and getting you out of that dress as well.”

“I’m very naked in your fantasies,” she said, giggling.

“We’re talking about what I wank to! Should I picture you in dress robes? In your fantasies are we fully clothed when I’ve got my hands between your legs?”

“No,” she said quietly. “And sometimes it’s not just your hands.”

He gulped. “Hermione…”

“I think about your mouth all over me.”

“I like the sound of that too.”

“And I think about your…”

He held his breath. Could this be real? “Bloody hell, now I really need a wank.”

“We could have one.”

“Or you could come here and we could have the real thing.”

“We haven’t even kissed yet!” She sounded offended.

“I’d kiss you plenty.”

“Absolutely not. The story of our first kiss is not going to be, ‘We were talking about masturbation and saying dirty things to each other so we decided to kiss and get on with it.’”

“Blimey, I’m really regretting all those times I wanted to kiss you and lost my nerve.”

“Me too. I kept thinking you were going to and then you never did. I thought I must be misreading things.”

“You could have kissed me.”

“I asked you out on a date and you took up with another girl a week later! You can’t blame me for being shy of making the first move after that. Besides, I did try to kiss you once at the Burrow, the night before we left with everyone to get Harry, and you turned your head!”

“Is that what you were doing? You looked like you were gearing up to lecture me.”

“I was trying to work up my courage!”

“I should have kissed you,” he said solemnly. “I’ve wanted to for ages and I talked myself out of it, or something got in the way. That’s the thing I think about the most, replaying all the times I wished I’d kissed you and imagining actually doing it.”

“Do we just kiss?” she said breathlessly. “Or more than that?”

“More than that.” He heard her blankets rustle, the bunk creak, and her let out an unfamiliar little sigh. The rustling continued and she let out another small sigh. After a minute it occurred to him what those noises could possibly be. “Hermione, Are you touching yourself right now?”

“I did say we should have a wank,” she said, embarrassed. “And I haven’t had one since we’ve been in this blasted tent.”

“I like it.” He couldn’t believe it; all those horrible things in his mind had been wrong. Though he knew he shouldn’t, he took off the locket and placed it on his pillow. This was too amazing a night to let a Horcrux ruin it. He started to stroke himself. “Where are your hands right now?”

“On my nipples.”

“Fuck. Can I see?”

“No! Not until after we’ve kissed.”

“You’ve seen me without my shirt on. It seems unequal.”

“Only briefly, you weren’t touching yourself, and you’re a boy.”

“I’m touching myself now and I’d let you look.”

“You would? All right then.” In a moment light was glowing from her wand and she was leaning down off her bunk. 

Ron had not actually expected her to take him up on this offer and wondered whether he could laugh it off. The look on her face, however, told him he could not. She was intent, determined, and--was it possible?--lustful. He pulled down the blankets and exposed himself, hoping desperately that he wasn’t humiliating himself in doing so.

She squealed with glee before extinguishing the light of her wand and laying back in her bunk. “I’ve never seen one in real life before! Oh, it’s lovely, Ron. Thank you.”

He was about to complain that she was making his penis sound like a bleeding unicorn when she whispered, “And so big. My goodness.”

“You like it?”

“I really, really like it.”

“I didn’t get to see anything though.”

“I’m touching myself and thinking about you, is that not enough for you?”

“Fucking hell. Where are your hands right now?”

“One’s still on my nipple. The other isn’t.”

“And you’re wishing it was me?” he begged.

“Yes, I’m wishing it was you.”

“Am I going to hear you come?”

“Probably. You could tell me more things you think about. It’s, er, helping.”

He took a steadying breath. More than anything else he wanted to hear what noises she made as she came. “I think about you bossing me around,” he admitted. “That voice you use when you think I’m being stupid and you’re correcting me. I think about touching you and you saying, ‘No, like  _ this _ , Ron,’ and teaching me. And when I finally, um, get it right, and you...well, you’re speechless, and then you say, with that surprised tone you have, ‘That was very good, Ronald. That was perfect.’”

She moaned a little. “Oh, that is good. I do like telling you what to do.”

“I know you do.” He listened to her breathing for a moment and tried to picture exactly what she was doing. He pictured himself doing it. He continued, “Sometimes I think of the opposite, though. Don’t get angry, but sometimes I think about you doing everything I tell you to, taking charge and you loving it. You saying nothing but ‘yes.’”

He waited for the criticism of this fantasy that he knew was coming. He immediately regretting sharing it, but for a brief moment he’d hoped she’d find it sexy, or at least funny.

She moaned again. “I like that as well.”

“Really?”

“It’s exhausting being me. It might be nice to lie back and let someone else take care of things.”

“I’ll take care of all your things,” he said and she laughed.

“Ron? I think about us fighting sometimes.”

“That turns you on? Is that why we argue so much?”

“No! It’s not the fighting exactly. It’s...I think about times we’ve fought and imagine we stop shouting before we hurt each other’s feelings and start kissing instead--kissing passionately and tearing each other’s clothes off.”

“Apparently I’m very naked in your fantasies too.”

“Now that I know what to picture I’m sure you’ll always be.”

It was too much; he stopped touching himself. “You keep saying things like that I’m not going to last much longer.”

“You can come.”

“I want you to first.”

“Such a gentleman.”

“If that’s what turns you on, sure.”

“You turn me on.”

“Are you close?”

“Getting there,” she panted.

“Can I watch you?”

“I already said--”

“Just your face. I just want to see your face when you…”

The thought of him watching her made her shiver with anticipation. “Okay. Hurry up here. But no touching.”

Of all the improbable things that were happening, this seemed the most unlikely. Ron muttered  _ lumos _ and hurried up the ladder of the bunk opposite his. He found Hermione, hair splayed wildly around her, one hand up her own shirt and the other under her blankets, looking at him hungrily. He lay down on his side next to her, resisting the urge to press against her. To his surprise, she snuggled against him.

“Nothing too sexual,” she said, and he did not laugh at this even though he wanted to. “But you can hold me.”

He pulled her close, one arm around her waist and the other in her messy hair. He could feel her arm moving under his as she touched herself. Nothing he’d ever seen was as wonderful as this. Her eyelids fluttered closed, and soft, kittenish noises escaped from her parted lips. Very lightly, he rubbed his thumb over her cheekbone. She smiled.

“You’ve stopped talking,” she said.

“I just want to look at you. Is that all right?”

She nodded and he watched her for an unknownable amount of time. He was transfixed. Then she started to moan deeply. She writhed in his arms, gasped, and looked more beautiful than he’d ever seen anyone look. 

Panting, she slid her hands out of her clothes and embraced him. He mumbled her name and held her tight. His erection was demanding attention painfully and her body pressed against him was not helping but he did not want to let go.

Ron kissed her on the top of the head and made to get up.

“Where are you going?” she demanded.

“I’ve got to…” He gestured vaguely at his crotch.

“You don’t have to go.” In response to his stunned face, she added, “It was nice, having you close. I’d like to see you too if you don’t mind.”

He nodded and lay on his back, Hermione turning onto her side and snuggling up to him. He pulled down his pyjama trousers and let her watch his hand moving on himself for several minutes. She was watching at him with such desire it was making his head spin. “Where should I come?” he whispered. “I don’t want to get it all over your bed.”

She hadn’t thought of this and barely summoned a rag in time. Fascinating, she thought as she watched him come. Boys were fascinating.

Afterward she laid her head on his chest and listened as his racing heart slow down. He ran his fingertips over her arm.

“I can’t believe we did that,” he said, dazed.

She laughed. “Me either. Running for our lives made us brave, I suppose?”

“Maybe sleeping three feet away from you finally broke me. Seeing you in your pyjamas every day’s been driving me mad.”

She lifted her head. “This does it for you? I’m not exactly a picture in the morning.” She waved a hand over her rumpled nightclothes and unruly hair.

“You’re  _ you _ and that always does it for me.”

Her eyes welled up and he froze. “I’m sorry,” he added reflexively.

“Don’t be sorry, I’m happy,” she said, wiping her eyes. “I’m so happy.”

“Can I kiss you finally?”

“Tomorrow. If we kiss now it’ll just wind me up again.”

“Want to wind you up,” he said into her ear as he snaked a hand over her lower back. She smiled and swatted his hand away.

“We need to sleep. You’re on watch in a few hours. Go back to your bunk.”

He rose and shook his head. “I’d have never expected you to have your way with me and then kick me out. It’s bad form.”

“If you want to do this again tomorrow night you’ll go to your own bed and get some sleep,” she said, struggling to sound firm.

Again? Tomorrow night? Ron felt slightly dizzy at the thought. He tried to sound casual as he said, “Only because you’re using your bossy voice and you know I like that.” He clambered back to his bunk.

Once there in the dark, he put the locket back on, which momentarily seemed to have less control over him. He closed his eyes even though he doubted he’d be able to sleep. All his senses were buzzing with her. He wanted remember every detail, replay every second. What he wouldn’t give for a pensieve, to walk into this memory again and again.

She, on the other hand, was relaxed in a way she hadn’t been in months. Finally, she thought. Finally.

“Goodnight, Hermione,” he called.

“Goodnight, Ron,” she murmured, yawned, and drifted off to very pleasant dreams.


	2. For All You Annoy Me, You’ve Also Got Me in Quite a State

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Once you masturbate together, you might as well kiss.

When Ron got back from his turn on watch, bleary-eyed from little sleep, Hermione was nowhere to be found. Harry was sound asleep, which Ron had wanted. Ron had spent the last four hours imagining walking into the tent, climbing into Hermione’s bunk again, and kissing her while Harry slept, oblivious. He was quite disappointed to be unable to do this.

Doubt crept in. Maybe she regretted it. Maybe she was avoiding him. She’d seemed so happy about it in the night but she’d had a lot of hours to come up with good reasons why this was a bad idea. He resigned himself to the lecture she may have rehearsed while he’d been fantasizing about her like an idiot.

He went to the bathroom and found it locked.

“Just a minute,” called Hermione. 

He went back to the kitchen and made two cups of tea. They’d have tea and talk and maybe pretend it never happened. 

“Hi,” she said shyly behind him and he jumped.

“Sorry,” she said. Her hair was piled into a messy topknot and her face looked freshly scrubbed, like she had determinedly freshened up. She was beaming at him, which he had not expected.

“Made you a cuppa,” he mumbled. 

She smiled and crossed the distance between them. Suddenly she was inches from him, looking up at him through her dark eyelashes. “Thank you, Ron.”

Then she did it, she stood on her tiptoes and wrapped her arms around his neck and finally, finally, kissed him full on the mouth. His anxiety melted away and he kissed her back with the sort of fervor she’s been hoping for. After a few minutes he turned them around and lifted her up so she was sitting on the tiny counter in the kitchen, pressing his body very close to hers.

“Now you don’t have to crane your neck up,” he said, kissing that neck.

“You’re so thoughtful.”

“I have my moments. Last night was…” He lost his train of thought kissing her earlobe.

“Amazing,” she sighed.

“Want to do it again?”

“We are certainly doing something tonight.”

“Tonight? Why not right now?”

She pulled back and gave him an incredulous look. “If Harry wakes up and finds us rolling around a few feet away from him it’s going to make life in this tent very awkward.”

“Let’s go outside then. Hide in some leaves.”

She shoved him playfully. “Yes, let’s lie on the freezing ground with dirt directly under my sensitive bits. What could go wrong?”

He nipped at her lower lip. “Keep talking about your bits and I’m going to take all your clothes off.”

“Stop,” she giggled and hopped down from the counter. “Let’s have our tea and try not to wake up Harry.”

Nearly as soon as they were huddled together at the little table, though, Harry yawned loudly and walked over to join them. Both Ron and Hermione were instantly silenced; Ron had been whispering something rather graphic in Hermione’s ear a moment before. Harry looked puzzled at their sudden silence but said nothing, just wordlessly took the locket from Ron. Ron did not complain all morning and that was enough for Harry.

Throughout the day Ron caught himself staring at Hermione, fixating on tiny details about her or daydreaming about her face the night before. He managed to shake himself out of it but not before she noticed him staring several times.

“We have to stop looking at each other like that,” she hissed when Harry was out of earshot. “He’s bound to realize something’s going on.”

“Why don’t we tell him?” Ron asked.

She shook her head. “What do you think that will do to him? He’s got an impossible task before him, he knows he either has to kill You-Know-Who or die himself, people are dying until he succeeds and he feels tremendous responsibility and pressure. He loves Ginny--don’t argue, you know he does--and he broke it off with her to keep her safe. He’s lonely and terrified. How well do you think he’d take it if his two best friends tell him they’ve struck up a romance in the tent where he’s stuck with both of them? Especially when he has no one else in the world to talk to?”

He set his jaw. Was it really all this or did she have other reasons for wanting to keep things a secret? Was she ashamed to be with him? Did she wish it was Harry in her bed instead of him? 

“Maybe he’d be happy for us,” he said sharply.

“Of course he would. But it would also be uncomfortable. Harry needs to stay focused on the Horcruxes.”

At Ron’s glare, she took his hand. “We’ll tell him,” she said gently. “When the time is right. But right now I want this to be only about us, you and me, not Harry or his reaction. I want some time that’s just ours.”

He softened. “All right, all right.”

She beamed at him and kissed him on the cheek. “Tonight,” she promised.

 

***

 

He had first watch and she had second, so they weren’t alone until around 3 am. As soon as Harry left the tent, Hermione crawled into Ron’s bunk. She whispered his name but he didn’t stir. She shook his shoulder. Nothing. She kissed him and after a second he kissed her back.

She was on top of him, kissing his neck, when he mumbled, “This is a nice dream.”

“It’s not a dream.”

He squeezed her hips and yawned. “I should wake up with you on top of me every day.”

“Maybe you will from now on.”

He tried to think of something to adequately express his delight at this idea but any words he had were lost in their kissing. Time seemed to stop as they explored this new possibility between them, unhurried in the darkness. They experimented with different ways of lying together, trying to find something both comfortable and not as intimate as either of them wanted, for fear the other wanted something tamer. Slowly they began to run their hands over each other, first arms and backs and stomachs, unsure of what the boundaries were. While he was top of her, Hermione slipped her hands up his shirt, feeling his skin. 

He pulled his shirt off to give her more access. “All right?” he asked.

“Better,” she said and touched his bare chest. Tentatively, she toyed with his nipples. “Does that feel good?” she asked.

“Yeah.” He moved to lift her shirt a little and kissed over her belly, making her laugh, and kissed his way up to the undersides of her breasts. There he stopped and waited, one hand just to the side of her breast.

“You can,” she said so quietly she wasn’t sure he’d heard her. When he didn’t move, she took his hand and cupped it over her left breast. He circled her nipple with his thumb through the thin fabric of her t-shirt. She gasped; she hadn’t expected to be so affected. Encouraged, he put his other hand to work on her right breast while kissing her.

Her shirt was still on, pushed up higher and higher under his hands. He slipped a thumb under the hem and when she kissed him harder in response, his whole hand. She sat up and let him pull her shirt off entirely, her chest bare except for the locket.

“Can we have a little light?” he asked into her collarbone.

She conjured a small flame in a glass.

He sat back and admired her for a moment. “Beautiful,” he sighed before lying down on her again.

She blushed. She was surprising herself with all this. How was it possible that in just over a day’s time she’d gotten here, shirtless with Ron sucking on her nipple? She tangled her fingers in his hair, urging him on.

“God, that’s good,” she moaned.

“Can’t wait to see you come again. I’ve been thinking about your face all day.”

“All right then,” she said and untied her pyjama bottoms. He took this as an invitation and started to move his hand down.

She caught him by the wrist. “What are you doing?” she asked.

“Hopefully bringing you off,” he said.

“What? No.”

He shifted to lay on his side next to her. “Why not?”

“We’ve only kissed earlier today. Don’t you think this is moving quite quickly?”

“I’ve fancied you for over a year!”

“And you spent half of that year aggressively snogging another girl in front of me,” she said pointedly.

He looked abashed. “Sorry about that. I was jealous,” he mumbled.

“You were jealous? Of what?”

“Well, you’d kissed Krum…”

She blinked at him. “What does me kissing Viktor fourth year have to do with anything?”

“I hadn’t realized you’d snogged somebody already,” he said in a rush, as though getting the words out more quickly would make them less unpleasant. “I’d figured, you know, our first kiss would be together. Then Ginny and I had a fight and she said it was only me who hadn’t kissed anyone and you’d kissed Krum. I hadn’t realized. Anyway, I thought, what if I was rubbish at it? If I was rubbish at kissing and you hadn’t kissed anyone either it wouldn’t matter too much; we’d figure it out together. But if you’d kissed Krum, well, he probably knew what he was doing. He’d probably been with loads of girls, international Quidditch star and all that. If you were comparing me to Krum and he was great and I was awful, you’d chuck me before we even really got started. I was angry at you for kissing him and ruining everything like that, but I couldn’t tell you because that was even more embarrassing.”

“So you stomped around being horrid to me and to everybody else and then took up with Lavender Brown?” she snapped. “That is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.”

“I didn’t say it was a good idea.”

“I wouldn’t have chucked you if our first kiss wasn’t good,” she said impatiently, drawing the blankets up to her armpits. “And I don’t know what you were worrying for, your kissing is wonderful.”

“Er, thanks, but I expect I was rubbish at it in the beginning.” He thought sympathetically of Lavender redirecting him on many early occasions when he attempted to shove his tongue against hers, opened his mouth much too wide, or somehow knocked their teeth together. For as much as he regretted hurting Hermione, he was also a little glad he hadn’t subjected her to his first forays into snogging.

“Still, you were an idiot,” she said stiffly. “I didn’t do anything wrong when I went out with Viktor and it wasn’t fair for you to punish me for it years later because of your insecurity.”

His face burned. “I know that now. I made a mess of things, and now I’ve ruined tonight as well.”

She turned onto her side and let the blanket drop to her waist. “No, you haven’t ruined tonight.” She kissed him very sweetly.

Relief flooded him. He pulled her so close their chests pressed together. He reached down and squeezed her ass. To his delight, she smiled.

“So I might still get to watch you come?” he asked.

“Yes. For all you annoy me, you’ve also got me in quite a state.”

“Can I help with that?”

“What you were doing before was nice. More of that please.”

He didn’t need to be asked twice. He began kissing her again, caressing her breasts and playing with her nipples. He kissed his way down her neck as she slid a hand into her own pants. Ron worked his mouth over her chest, repeating whatever made her moan, and tried not to get distracted by the enticing prospect of what her hand was doing.

“Can I look?” he asked her when it seemed like she was getting close.

She wouldn’t have imagined herself being so willing to be fully naked so quickly, but something in the way he looked at her when he asked undid her. It wasn’t just the hunger in his eyes, it was also that he was looking at her like she was the most beautiful person he’d ever seen. She was surprised to find that she didn’t feel self-conscious at all as she let him pull off the rest of her clothing. The way he was watching her was pushing her toward the edge.

He stared at her hand moving between her legs, the dark hair, the glistening folds, all a little hard to see in the dim light. He wanted to move closer, to bury his face there, but he felt he’d pushed his luck enough just by being allowed to watch this. Ron tried to memorize how and where she was moving her hand so that, when or if he was ever lucky enough, he could touch her exactly as she liked it.

“You’ve stopped what you were doing,” she chided breathlessly. 

“Sorry, sorry.” He went back to licking her nipples and rolling them between his thumb and forefinger. His efforts were rewarded when she gasped, nodded, and soon after, came, pulling his hair while she did. 

He rested his head on her shoulder afterward and she ran her fingers through his hair.

“Ron,” she sighed, contented.

“I really liked that bit when you pulled my hair,” he said. “Do it again while I…?”

She obliged happily. Between the sight of her still very naked body, what had just happened, and her yanking on his hair, he wasn’t surprised that he was hurtling toward climax in a matter of minutes.

“Summon a rag or something,” he told her.

“Or you could, on me, if you wanted,” she whispered. She moved one hand down, her thumb barely brushing against his tip. That did it. Instantly he was coming on her hand, her belly, his own hand.

“Hermione,” he said, amazed.

“It’s so warm,” she said curiously.

He raised his eyebrows at her. “Did you think it’d be cold?”

“I never thought about it at all,” she said, blushing. She waved her wand and cleaned them both up. He wrapped an arm around her and pulled her to him, bare torsos fully aligned.

Ron stroked her hair; it was tickling his neck but he didn’t mind. “You’re amazing,” he said.

“I didn’t do anything,” she said, though she sounded pleased.

“Don’t be modest.” He kissed gently but was interrupted by Hermione yawning.

“Sorry, I’m exhausted. We’re going to have to find a way to do this and still sleep.”

“I don’t need sleep.” He kissed her more passionately. “Just need you.”

“You’re ridiculous!” she said, laughing.

“You like it, though,” he said. He wanted to sound confident but worried he sounded like he was begging, which, if he was honest, he was.

“I really do.” She yawned again. “But I need to sleep.”

She started getting dressed. While she put on her clothes she had the distinct feeling of his eyes watching her and shivered with a private thrill at this. He hugged her around the middle as she stood up to go to her own bunk.

“Tomorrow?” he asked, shamelessly begging this time.

“Tomorrow,” she promised and kissed him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Reviews are much appreciated! Thanks, folks.


	3. An Unexpectedly Dirty Mouth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hermione tries not to overthink. Something from the past gets cleared up. Things start getting smuttier.

Hermione spent the whole of the next day highly distracted by what she wanted to do and all the reasons she knew she shouldn’t do those things. She was thrilled to finally be with Ron but she also had concerns. The most pressing of these was that they could not, under any circumstances, let Harry find out, which was difficult considering how much she and Ron were both staring each other.

If Harry knew what she and Ron were embarking on, Harry might put into words some of the fears she was scrupulously avoiding acknowledging. Launching into a sexual relationship with one of your best friends while completely isolated from everyone but him and your other mutual best friend was, objectively, not a good idea. Doing this while having no reliable source of food, while toting around an extremely evil object and trying to find and destroy several other evil, dangerous objects, and while being actively pursued by many of people who wanted to murder the lot of you was, well, idiotic. Hermione was working very hard not to think about this. Ron hadn’t seemed to consider any of these things but Harry might, and if Harry pointed it out her brain would not let it go. Which would mean she would not be able to continue doing this thing they were doing and she really, really did not want to stop.

Telling Harry also meant their entire dynamic changing forever, though she didn’t think Ron realized this. Once they admitted to Harry that they were involved, that they had their own private world that he had no place in, it wouldn’t be how it had always been before. It had been the three of them as a unit, sometimes two of them without the third when one was busy or when interests aligned in a particular way, but never to the clear exclusion of the someone. Sometimes they fought but they always made up. This was different. There had never been a realm that two of them entered together that the third could not--until this.

Hermione thought it unlikely that their friendship would ever be the same after this. If they were lucky enough to survive, she and Ron would eventually break up or become more serious, more of a proper couple. Those were the only two avenues she saw available. If they broke up, they wouldn’t go back to the friendship they’d had before, not right away but probably not at all. There was some line that, if crossed, prevented you from slipping back into easy friendship. She wasn’t sure what the line was exactly but she was certain they were on the verge of crossing it. A line that, when she was honest with herself, she wanted to cross regardless of the consequences.

And if they didn’t break up, what would happen to their friendship with Harry then? Already she and Ron were stumbling upon secret knowledge about one another that Harry would never know. Whether or not he said anything, she suspected Harry would feel a bit out in the cold if she and Ron got wrapped up in each other.

Which all meant that, best case scenario, their perfect triad of friendship would in some way fracture and shift. Worst case scenario, she lost one or both of them. No, worst case scenario was that they all died horribly looking for Horcruxes. But in no version did things remain as they had been for the past six years and this was a little sad. 

Then there was the other matter of wanting to do things with Ron that she had never done with anyone before but that he’d already experienced. She felt slightly more sympathetic toward his jealousy about Viktor. It wasn’t that he’d finish with her if she wasn’t good, but she hated to be less than perfect at anything. At the very least she wanted him to enjoy things more with her than he had with Lavender, but that seemed unlikely considering Lavender’s prowess and sexual openness. She wished that she could go to the library and find a book on the subject.

All these thoughts were making her flustered. She worried that Harry would notice her distraction but he did not. Ron, however, was quite amused by her uncharacteristic clumsiness and imperfect spellwork. She even had to use a verbal spell to start a fire, which she been doing nonverbally for nearly a year.

“I’ve never seen you like this!” he laughed.

“I can’t seem to concentrate,” she said, even more discomposed by the attention.

“Anything on your mind?” he asked suggestively.

“No,” she lied. “I’m just tired.”

“Why are you so tired, I wonder?” He rubbed his stubbly chin. She felt, annoyingly, a terrible attraction to his unshaven face. Maybe he should grow a beard, she thought. Could he grow a beard? What exactly was so alluring about a bit of ginger hair on his face? Why was she so consumed by the thought of touching his cheeks, the thought of kissing him and seeing if it was scratchy against her in a pleasant or unpleasant way, the thought of what his face might feel like, say, against her thighs...

She shook the thoughts from her head and glared at him, as if he had made her mind wander in such a way. He only grinned and she decided that actually it was his doing. After all, he had said quite a lot of dirty things to her. He had offered to touch her. It was entirely his fault that she could not stop thinking about how, later that night, she planned to have him do just that.

It was all the more disconcerting to her that Ron didn’t seem addled in the slightest. On the contrary, the last two evenings seemed to have improved his mood considerably. Though, she admitted to herself, part of that might have been a couple of lucky days catching fish and picking at strangers’ vegetable patches while leaving some coins in exchange. A hungry Ron was a grouchy Ron.

Harry had first watch that night, meaning she and Ron only had to wait for the sun to start setting. When that time came and Harry left the tent, Ron and Hermione waited silently at the little table until his footsteps faded from earshot. Then Ron raised an eyebrow.

“What do you want to do now?” he asked.

She looked down at her hands. She had nearly talked herself out of going near him.

“Come here,” he said when she didn’t answer.

She walked over to him and he pulled her into his lap. At once he was kissing her and she melted into it. Mouths were so marvelous, she thought. Everything else faded from her mind, and they kissed, her in his lap in that hard wooden chair, for perhaps a long time.

“Bed,” he said eventually, and they stumbled together to his bunk, where they lay on their sides and kissed. His hands roamed over the places he’d touched the night before, and bit by bit her nerves were forgotten under the intensity of her desire. It felt too good to worry about.

He shifted so he was on top of her, her legs spread and him between them. His erection pressed against her, right against--

“Oh,” she squeaked.

“You like that?” he asked, starting to grind against her.

“Wait!”

He stopped and looked down at her face.

“I haven’t done this before. What we’ve done already, it’s further than I’d ever gone,” she said, embarrassed. “I know you’ve done, well, everything already, but I haven’t. I’m not having sex for the first time in this tent while we’re on the run for our lives. You might think it’s silly but I want my first time to be special.”

“I don’t think that’s silly.” He frowned. “What do you mean, I’ve ‘done everything already’?”

“With Lavender,” she said impatiently.

“I’ve done more with you than I ever did with her.”

“Don’t lie. It doesn’t make me feel better and--”

“I’m not lying! It was all above the waist. Well, I grabbed her bum and there was some grinding, but we kept our pants well on and nobody had an orgasm or anything.”

She eyed him skeptically. “That’s not how she told it.”

He looked horrified. “What?!”

“According to her, you had your fingers in her so often she was practically a puppet and she was, for want of a better term, the queen of blow jobs,” she said crisply. “She implied you two were shagging or at least seriously considering it.”

“None of that happened!” He rolled off of her and looked squeamish. “Not at all. Why the fuck would she say that? And to you of all people?”

“She didn’t say it  _ to _ me. She talked about with Parvati and we all shared a dormitory. Though sometimes I think she said things within my earshot to let me know that you were taken.”

“Hermione,” he said faintly. “I’m so sorry. I had no idea. It wasn’t true, any of it. I never--we  _ never _ \--”

“I believe you.” She relaxed a little. “Thank goodness. I don’t think I could live up to the sort of sexual prowess she was describing.”

He looked stricken. “Why would she lie like that?”

“I suppose she wanted to seem worldly and experienced. She made it sound like the two of you were quite serious about each other and you couldn’t resist her, and it seemed like your fantastic sexual relationship was a big part of that.”

“Serious about each other? Sexual relationship? None of that was real!”

“Well, I didn’t know that, did I?”

“No wonder you wouldn’t talk to me.”

She smiled sadly. “Harry kept trying to get me to make up with you and I wanted to slap him. I thought he was being wildly insensitive considering how you and Lavender were both flaunting your relationship.”

“We didn’t know what she was saying. I can’t believe you let me near you after hearing all that.”

She shrugged. “As aggravating as it was, in the end I still fancied you, and I missed you. I was disappointed and it had hurt to witness, but it wasn’t as though you’d cheated on me. It wasn’t worth giving up on you, just because you had a relationship before.”

He felt ashamed of himself, as this was more or less exactly the opposite of his reaction when he’d learned she’d kissed someone years earlier. “I don’t deserve you,” he said quietly.

“Don’t say that. I did set those birds on you the first night you kissed her, so I’m not exactly in the right, am I? Besides, this was just a misunderstanding. Now that I don’t have to worry about your standards being set by perfect Lavender, I feel much better about trying things together.”

He covered his face with his hands. “That’s terrible, Hermione. That’s really terrible.”

She toyed with a loose thread on the blanket. “I was worried you’d be disappointed with me, to be honest. I don’t know if I’ll be any good at any of those sorts of things, and it usually takes me a little time to, um, orgasm, so--”

“Like I’d be disappointed about touching you for longer than a minute?” he said, amused. “Like I don’t want my hands on you for as long as you’ll let me?”

A little formally she added, “I’ve never really tried penetration. I don’t know if I’ll like it and I’m nervous about it.”

Even in the darkness it was clear Ron was very red. “I’ll do whatever you like, what you do to yourself. We don’t need to mess around trying things you aren’t excited about.”

“That’s nice to hear.” She smiled shyly. “What if I’m not good at…?”

“Come off it, you’re perfect at everything. Besides, getting to see you naked is enough for me, even if you don’t want to do anything else.”

“I do want to do something else, though,” she said, more flirtatiously than he expected.

He gulped. “Anything in particular?”

“You could touch me and then maybe I can touch you.”

“Happy to,” he said, though he sounded rather stunned. He reached down the front of her jeans.

“Warm me up a bit first!” she giggled. “Some kissing at least. Or what you did last night.”

He kissed her and moved his hand around to squeeze her ass. He kissed and sucked on her neck, slid off her shirt, and cupped her breasts through her bra, which was the prettiest and laciest one she owned. Judging by the look on his face, she’d made the right decision wearing it.

“Perfect,” he said admiringly. “Gorgeous. But why are you wearing a bra?”

“It’s daytime. I’m not in my pyjamas for once.”

“Take it off.”

She liked the commanding tone he took. She unhooked her bra. He slipped it off and tossed it on the ground.

“We had better not forget that later,” she warned him. “I don’t want Harry finding my underthings all over the place.”

“Don’t talk about Harry right now,” he said in that delicious tone again. Ron bit at her right nipple lightly and she gasped.

“I won’t talk at all,” she promised.

“You silent? I doubt it,” he said and she shoved him a little. “You can say how much you like what I’m doing.”

“I really like what you’re doing.”

He played with her tits for awhile, which was wonderful. A few times she thought he might plunge his hand back down her knickers--he had a look in his eye--but he didn’t. She wondered if he was waiting for her permission or if he was making her want it more. Or perhaps getting completely unlimited access to her entire naked torso was distracting him from other options. Every one of these possibilities excited her.

“Ron,” she moaned after some time. “You could, if you wanted…”

“You’ll have to tell me how you like it,” he said, his turn to be shy. “I, uh, obviously haven’t--”

“I’ll talk you through it.”

“Do that bossy voice.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said in exactly the tone that she knew he wanted. “Lick your fingers first.”

“Ahh, that’s it.” He obeyed and moved his hand down, through the curls there, over her wet lips. He seemed uncertain what to do next. It was teasing to have his hand so close to where she needed. Then he parted her lips and touched her nearly where she wanted, close enough to make her gasp.

“Found it?” he asked hopefully.

“Just a little higher.”

He adjusted and she nodded. 

“Oh, that’s it?” he asked, sounding delighted.

She nodded some more. “Circle around it for now though, not on it. It’s too intense just yet. That’s right, gentle but firm. Oh my God, yes.”

She could not believe how quickly he was finding the right way to touch her. She’d expected a lot more fumbling and awkwardness. “You’re very good at this,” she said, a bit suspiciously.

“Always the tone of surprise.” He nipped at her neck.

She caught his face in her hands and looked deeply into his blue eyes. “You really haven’t done this before?”

“Is that supposed to be a compliment?”

“I’m serious.” He had not stopped touching her and it was making it difficult to get the words out.

“Hermione! Of course I haven’t.”

“I thought I’d have to give you a lot more direction.”

He grumbled, “Maybe I have some natural talent?”

She raised her eyebrows. “Clearly you do but you also seem to know your way around.”

“I was paying attention last night while I watched you touch yourself. I’ve been replaying it in my head all day. With the time I’ve spent picturing it, I’d better have the general idea.”

“That was very clever,” she said and gave his hair a tug. “Play with my tits as well?”

“Did you just say ‘tits’?” he asked hungrily.

“Shut up.” Her face felt very hot.

“Who knew you had a dirty mouth?”

“It’s your influence.”

“I like influencing you.” He put his head between her breasts, kissing all over them while he continued to circle her clit with his fingers. 

She felt the tension build in her. As she got closer to the edge she told him, “Touch right on it now. More to the left. Not so hard. Yes, like that. Keep making circles. Oh, that’s perfect.”

“This is exactly how it goes in my fantasies, you know that?” he said, looking up from her chest.

“Stop talking. I need your mouth on my tits.”

“Bloody hell,” he mumbled but did as he was told. She let out a moan, louder than she realized it would be, and he speed up his touch in excitement.

“No, what you were doing before,” she said impatiently. “Yes, that. Don’t speed up or change it all. Don’t stop. Just keep doing--oh, yes, Ron--”

She was coming, small and wild sounds escaping her, cresting and falling and thinking of nothing, just pleasure and then peace. He continued to touch her until she whispered, “Stop,” and then he lay beside her.

“That was the hottest fucking thing ever,” he said, almost as breathless as she was.

“My goodness,” she said.

He laughed. “That’s all you have to say?”

“I’m lost for words to be honest.”

He grinned at her. “I’ve shut up Hermione Granger!”

“I’ll shut you up in a minute!”

Ron kissed her softly. “I did all right?”

“You were incredible.”

“We found something I’m good at.” He sounded playful but also, she thought, a little sad.

“You’re good at lots of things,” she said earnestly.

He shook his head. “I can’t believe I brought you off. Best night of my fucking life.”

“It’ll get better once I’ve caught my breath.” She rubbed his hard-on through his trousers.

“You’re sure I’m not dreaming this?”

In response Hermione pinched his nipple. 

“Oi!” he shouted.

“No, you’re awake,” she said wryly. 

He kissed her again, this time urgently. “Touch it,” he said into her mouth.

She’d wanted another minute to enjoy the afterglow and to come back to herself but she found this request irresistible. She fumbled with the button and zipper of his jeans, freeing his cock with some difficulty as she shifted onto her side. She wrapped a hand around it timidly. The skin was so soft.

“Harder than that,” he insisted. She squeezed tighter until he nodded. “Move your hand up and down. Yeah, stroke it. Fuck, yes, Hermione.”

She did as he said, watching the foreskin roll back and forth over the head. She had an unexpected urge to touch the tip again, which she indulged by circling her thumb over it lightly. This elicited a string of expletives from Ron, but clearly happy ones. She experimented with rhythm and pressure, watching him, trying to give him what he liked.

“Tell me you liked it,” he said after a while. “Tell me how good I made you feel.”

“You were perfect, Ron. Nobody’s ever made me feel like that. You made me come so hard.”

“Yeah, you liked it when I touched you?” He squeezed one of her breasts.

“I loved it.”

“And you like this too?”

“Touching your cock? Yes, I do.”

“Say that again.”

She leaned her mouth close to his ear. “I love touching your big cock after you made me come.” She felt his cum start to burst onto her hand, her belly. She didn’t stop until she felt no more.

“Oh shit, I meant to give you some warning,” he said after she’d released him. “Your filthy mouth did me in. Or maybe your hands. Hermione, you were  _ brilliant _ .”

She waved her wand and cleaned them up. “I’m glad you liked it.”

“It’s like I said, you’re perfect at everything.”

She shrugged but smiled. “Not everything.”

‘Yeah you are.” He pulled her to his chest. She was overcome with the same tenderness that had made her weep the other night. Hermione traced the freckles on his arm, then caught sight of the time on his watch.

“Ron, it’s quarter ‘til eleven!” she exclaimed and started to get up. “Harry’ll be back soon.”

He pulled her back. “Five more minutes?”

“We can have a cuddle after we’re both dressed and I find my bra.”

“I don’t want a cuddle with our clothes on.” He sounded sulky.

“Well, then no cuddling at all.”

She felt his hands on her back and considered letting him pull her into an embrace. Then they heard rustling outside the tent. They both dressed hastily and Hermione had only just shoved her bra into her bag when Harry walked in.

“You’re awake?” he asked her, surprised.

“Couldn’t sleep,” she lied breezily. Ron closed his eyes and stayed still.

“Bring an extra jumper,” Harry told her. “It’s getting cold out there at night.”

“Thanks, good night,” she said and in a few minutes she was out of the tent. The part of Ron’s brain that was suspicious and vulnerable to the locket started spinning a terrible story about why Hermione was lying. He tried to block out the thought by remembering her face as she came, her words in his ear, her hands on him. It worked just long enough for him to fall asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like I was mean to Lavender here BUT I am convinced there was some serious tension during 6th year as she and Hermione shared a dorm. I can her saying things to make it clear her boyfriend was taken and to seem impressive or shocking. I don’t see it as a character flaw, just as coming from a place of insecurity (and shrewdness--she knew Ron’s feelings for Hermione were a threat to her relationship). I imagine there was some behind-the-scenes stuff that kept Hermione unwilling to talk to Ron for so long. I am also certain that Ron was oblivious to all of this.


	4. It *Is* Thursday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Despite their nights together, the locket is doing a number on Ron and it's putting a strain on them. Some arguing, some hurt feelings, some making up, some smut, some comfort, and a reminder about why you might want to keep track of what day it is.

Soon they fell into an unspoken routine. On the nights Hermione or Harry were wearing the locket, if they’d had enough food that day, Ron and Hermione crawled up in his bunk as soon as they were alone. They kissed and touched and sometimes, afterwards, held each other for as long as they could in the cold night. They did not explore anything beyond what they’d tried on their first nights together but what they shared was thrilling every time. Ron marveled at how eager she was to get into his bed. Even if they’d bickered in the day, more evenings than not she kissed him. She asked him to take off her clothes, explore her body, bring her off. She made him come in her hand and whispered things in his ear that made him blush.

On nights when Ron wore the locket, they only slept. His mood was too sour and besides, they were tired from the other nights together. They did not talk about this. On hungry days too, they kissed a little but rarely did more than that. Sometimes she put her head on his bare chest and he tried to remember how much he’d wanted even just that.

Ron resented the circumstances they were in. He’d wanted to be with her for so long but because of their situation he couldn’t fully enjoy it. They always had to be quiet, had to make sure Harry didn’t catch them. They were hungry and tired and cold. Why couldn’t it have all happened at Hogwarts, where they could have whole Saturday afternoons in secluded parts of the castle and the grounds? They could have been doing this with full bellies and soft beds, without a Horcrux twisting his head around again and again.

The more he thought all this the worse it got, and when he wore the locket it was all he could think about. Why did they have to wear the fucking thing? Why was it taking so long to find a way to destroy it and to find the rest? Sometimes he blamed Harry. When he was feeling short-tempered and resentful, he made it clear he thought that Harry did not know what he was doing. Dumbledore must have told him more and Harry had failed to understand. 

Or maybe Dumbledore was just a dick who hadn’t left them anything to go on and the whole mission was pointless.

Sometimes when he wore the locket Ron hated his own uselessness even more than he begrudged Harry for his failure of leadership. He’d been banking on Harry having a plan and on Hermione knowing all the answers. What was he bringing to the mission? Why had he come along at all? He thought of all the ways he wasn’t special or clever like the other two. He couldn’t do anything to improve their lot and he felt miserable at his helplessness. 

Which brought him to the question of why Hermione wanted to be with him. What did she see in him? He didn’t ask Hermione this. He was afraid of what her answer might be. 

One afternoon nearly three weeks after they first kissed, he brought up his frustrations about Harry to her. Ron had been hoping for some reassurance and he was surprised to hear express her own doubts.

“I thought he’d have more to go on too,” she admitted, her face very close to his. “But he’s doing his best. I’m disappointed it’s not going faster. We all just have to help one another.”

“How can we help? We don’t know what we’re doing.”

“There isn’t another option though, is there? You-Know-Who can’t be killed until we destroy the Horcruxes.”

“We could--” he started but Hermione pulled away and looked behind him. Harry was standing in the distance, watching them talking. Quickly they busied themselves gathering water.

“Harry’s bound to wonder why he keeps catching us whispering,” Hermione said. “I can’t count how many times he’s walked in on us and we’ve gone silent.”

“We’re usually talking about what we’re going to do to each other later,” Ron said, a little more cheerful.

“Whether we’re flirting or worrying about finding Horcruxes, it must be unsettlingly for him to have his friends stop talking whenever he walks in.”

“We could tell him what we’re doing.”

“No,” she said firmly.

He turned away from her. He knew the reasons she said she didn’t want to tell Harry but he wondered if these were her real motives for keeping it a secret.

But that night, when his turn with the locket was over and she was kissing him, his fears seemed less solid. Harry wasn’t trying to make things difficult. Hermione cared for him. It was easier to remember this when she was naked and moaning very softly. It brought him out of his darker thoughts, watching her eyelids flutter closed as she came under his hand. 

After she caught her breath she told him in a whisper, “I’m going to kiss all your freckles.”

“Not possible,” he said.

“Nonsense, I just need to be methodical. First I’ll do the ones on your face.” Her lips trailed over the bridge of his nose, making them both laugh. She peppered his cheeks and forehead with kisses, then his neck, his chest. Hermione kissed over his stomach and moved her head so low he wondered what she had in mind. Then she stopped kissing him and took him in her hand, stroked him while pressing her naked, wet sex against his thigh. 

“You really do have freckles all over,” she said, looking at a single freckle on his cock. The way she said it, the way she looked at him, made him wonder again what she was planning to do. For a moment it was clear to him that this was the real thing and the time with the locket was the lie. She really did want to be with him. And she was saying so, her mouth to his ear, telling him she wanted him, that no one had ever made her feel this way, that he made her feel so good, saying everything he wanted her to say as she made him come. 

“You’re so good at that,” he said into her hair afterward.

“I like doing it. I like making you feel good.”

He breathed her in. “I liked you kissing my freckles too. You know what? You can do that anytime you want. My freckles are all yours from here on out.”

“Basically all your skin belongs to me now?” she laughed.

“Yeah, it’s all yours,” he said.

He thought she’d laugh but instead she looked at him with an overwhelming sort of affection that felt, he thought, a lot like love.

The next night she came to him when they were alone, even though he wore the locket.

“I want to visit my freckles,” she said, smiling, as she sat on his bed.

A voice in his head hissed that ‘giving her his freckles’ had been a stupid thing to say. He felt embarrassed. He grunted and rolled away from her. “I’m tired,” he snapped.

“Oh, okay,” she said softly. “We don’t have to, um, do anything. I just thought--”

“Why did you start this?” he snarled, turning back to her. All the thoughts that had been swirling around his brain for weeks could no longer be contained. “What are you getting out of this really?”

“I like you,” she said, stunned. “I’ve liked you for ages, Ron. This feels good, being together--”

“But we’re not together. We’re just fumbling around in the dark.”

She recoiled. “That’s not what this is.”

“Isn’t it? You aren’t just lonely? You aren’t just looking for a bit of fun, some relief? Maybe a distraction for the fact that we don’t know what we’re doing out here and this wandering is pointless?”

“Is that what this is to you?” she asked, her voice unsteady. “A distraction?”

He thought of Lavender. He’d thought he knew at the time what his relationship with her was and what she wanted with him--some fun, a bit of exploration and the pleasure of being chosen by someone. But she’d been off telling tales about some entire other version of things. Had she wanted something else and he not noticed? Or had he been just an accessory for a reputation she was trying to cultivate? He no longer had any idea. If he could be so wrong about Lavender after dating her for quite some time, could he really trust his own judgment when it came to Hermione? How could he know if she was lying or not? There was some piece he was missing.

“I dunno,” he said as he turned away again. “I need to sleep.”

She didn’t say anything as she went up to her bunk but for a minute he thought he heard her crying.

The next day after a few hours free from the locket and some good luck finding food, he felt guilty. Ron hadn’t meant it, or at least, he hadn’t meant it the way it came out. They hadn’t argued, though. He took that as a good sign. While he was forging for food that afternoon, he also looked for flowers. There weren’t many but he picked the few he found as he went. He’d gotten two when he spotted her, a harsh frown on her face.

“Hi,” he said. “I got these for you.”

She looked at the flowers with disdain. “You think I want flowers after what you said to me last night?”

“I’m sorry. I--”

“Don’t say you were hungry. I was hungry too. How could you say--” Her voice broke and she shut her eyes as if to keep tears from spilling out. “It’s like this doesn’t mean anything to you.”

He looked down and resolved not to tell her about the locket. He knew it bothered all of them yet he also knew it held more power over him. It was shameful that he was so influenced by it.

“I shouldn’t have said it the way I did. It’s not just a distraction for me, not at all. I was feeling, I don’t know, like maybe it doesn’t mean so much to you.”

She drew up very close to him and said fiercely, “I’m not going to keep doing this with you if that’s what you think.”

Ron felt as though he’d been slapped. It was the first either of them suggested they might stop. “If you don’t want to,” he muttered.

“Of course I want to! I’ve told you how much I fancy you. Why would I be telling you I like you if I didn’t? How can you think I don’t care?” she said, her voice high.

Just then he caught sight of Harry watching them. Ron shot Hermione a meaningful look and they were silent. As they rushed off to busy themselves with chores she whispered, “How much do you think he heard?”

“Maybe nothing, but we were acting strangely.”

“He’s going to have questions,” she said nervously. But Harry said nothing about this, just as he’d said nothing any of the other times they’d stopped talking abruptly when he walked in.

Ron was content not to worry about Harry anymore for the day. He was more concerned with how exactly he might make things up to Hermione.

When evening arrived, Hermione changed into her pyjamas early and announced she was going to bed, though they’d only just finished dinner and washing up. Ron hoped this was for Harry’s benefit, but once Harry left for first watch, Hermione did not leave her bunk. He climbed up.

“Can I sit with you?” he asked.

“No,” she growled.

“Come down to mine then.”

“No.”

“At least come have some tea with me.”

“I don’t want tea.”

“Hermione, please come talk to me,” he begged.

She agreed a little reluctantly and they sat in armchairs, her glaring at him as she tapped her foot. He tried to think of something to say as he stared at her over the single flame she’d left burning in a glass on the table.

“I was being stupid before,” he said cautiously. “I’m sorry. Can we forget I said that stuff? Can we please keep doing this?”

“Of course we’ll keep doing this,” she said quietly. “I can’t say no to you.”

He found this revelation startling. “Really?”

“I find you irresistible and it’s infuriating sometimes,” she said hotly.

This information made him feel nearly giddy. “You’ve got the same sway of me. I’d do anything for you.”

“Except be polite to me or--”

“I’ll make it up to you.”

“How?” she demanded. “And don’t make a joke or try to kiss me right now. I’m still mad at you.”

He got up and pulled her up to him for an embrace, which she allowed. “I love you even when you’re mad at me,” he said without thinking about it.

“You love me?” She sounded shocked.

He realized the gravity of what he’d said and considered trying to downplay it. But, no, he did love her. Of course he did. “I’ve told you before,” he said.

“Not when we were--not like this! Just as friends!”

“I didn’t mean just as friends then either. I’ve felt this way a long time,” he said gravely.

She sputtered and started several words that she was unable to finish before saying, “You don’t get to be a prat and then tell me you love me and have me forgive you!”

“What should I do then?” 

He watched her irritation flatter. When she said nothing, he kissed her. She kissed him back. Ron maneuvered her into his bed and on top of him. He snaked his hands up her shirt, peeled it off her, gripped her hips and ground her against him as he kissed her neck. After a few minutes playing with her nipples, he heard her moan in a very promising way.

“I love you,” he said again.

“Stop saying that,” she said, with another moan as she rocked against him. “I’m still furious at you, Ronald Weasley.” 

“Of course, obviously, with good reason. Would an orgasm help?”

“You can try.” She already sounded breathy.

He tore off his shirt, finished undressing her, and teased around her clit. She nodded, encouraging, which surprised him. Usually they kissed and such for some time before she let him touch her that way. Maybe the fighting did turn her on a little, or maybe his efforts to make it up to her were paying off? Or maybe, just maybe, it was that he’d said he loved her?

Ron touched her the way he knew she wanted, marveling at how quickly it had become familiar to him. How quickly they’d learned the basics of each other’s bodies. He knew what the speed of her breath meant, when to adjust and when to hold steady. A little sooner than he expected, she jerked and cried out, that beautiful look on her face.

She collapsed onto her belly next to him, her hair falling on his face.

“Am I forgiven now?”

“I still haven’t decided,” she said, face down into the pillow, but he knew she was smiling.

“Will another orgasm do it?”

Hermione lifted her head and looked at him with her mouth agape. “Another?”

“We always settle for just one but maybe we could do better than that for you.”

“I’ve never--”

“No time like the present.”

“What about you?”

“You’re more important.” He flipped her onto her back and kissed down her chest.

“You really are sorry, aren’t you?” she said fondly.

“That and I want to make you happy.”

She held his face in her hands. “You do, you know.”

“Mmm-hmm,” he said into her breasts. He reached between her legs.

“Maybe we could try something,” she said.

He raised his head and looked at her, expectant.

“You could put a finger in, if you wanted. It’s not something I’ve done myself really but--”

“Tell me how it feels, yeah?” he said huskily, already pushing his finger tip inside her. She was so tight yet yielding, so hot and wet. The thought that he might someday feel her here with his… He shook the thought out of his head. He needed to concentrate on her reactions. He eased one finger almost completely in and her body seemed more than accommodating. He looked at her face and she nodded encouragement.

He moved his finger in and out, angled it until she made a promising sound, speed up and slowed down until she told him what she liked better. Ron adjusted so his thumb could rub her clit, very grateful for some summer afternoons spent with helpful diagrams in  Twelve Fail-Safe Ways to Charm Witches . She squirmed and began to move with him.

“More,” she groaned.

“You’re so wet,” he said, gliding another finger in with surprising ease.

“That’s what you do to me,” she murmured and rocked against his hand.

He couldn’t believe it, the heat of her, the slickness, the sounds she was making even as she tried to be quiet. Ron thought he could go on with it forever, but none of it compared to the feel around his fingers when she came. He could do that every day for the rest of his life and never tire of it. He needed to remember that next time he was wearing that fucking Horcrux. He needed to hold these thoughts close when fears crept in. When she was finished and he pulled his hand away, he felt the wetness lingering thickly on his fingers.

“That was amazing,” she said. “I had no idea.”

He held up his hand to admire the flood he’d induced and Hermione let out a very different sort of gasp.

“Oh no!” she squeaked. “Oh no, oh no.”

He noticed in the dim light something dark on his fingers but could not work what it was or what had prompted Hermione’s sudden change in demeanor. She frantically threw back the blankets to reveal a large, rapidly spreading dark stain. She grabbed her wand, lit it, and he realized that the stain on the bed, like his fingers, was not simply dark but red. He, she and his bed were all covered in blood.

“Oh my God,” he mumbled. “Did I--are you okay? Are you hurt? What should we do?”

She was now leaping around in a way that he did not think a heavily bleeding person ought to be doing, rummaging in her bag and still quite naked and dripping blood.

“I can’t believe it,” she said. “It wasn’t due til Thursday.”

He had no idea what she was talking about but at least he knew what day it was. As gently as he could, he said, “Hermione, it _ is _ Thursday. Um, what should we do?”

She found something in her bag, rushed off to the bathroom, and he lay there uncertain what to do or how serious the problem was. With nothing better to do, he pulled on his underwear and pyjama bottoms, then grabbed his wand and began cleaning up the blood. Thanks to years of friendship with frequently-bloody Harry, at least he was proficient in a spell for it tidying up. Though he hadn’t ever envisioned using it quite like this.

By the time Hermione emerged from the bathroom he’d mostly gotten everything clean. She looked embarrassed but otherwise unharmed. “I’m sorry,” she said as gathered and put on her clothes.

“You’re sorry? I’m the one who’s sorry. Are you all right?”

She sat down next to him and finished getting out a stubborn spot of blood with her wand. “I’m fine. I’m embarrassed; I can’t believe I lost track of what day it is.”

“What does that have to do with it?”

“I got my period all over your bed,” she hissed. “And you!” She hid her face in her hands.

He breathed a sigh of relief. “That’s what happened? I’d thought I’d hurt you.”

“Your first thought was injury and not something that happens to about half the population every month?”

“Well, I don’t have any experience with periods, do I?” he said defensively. “I’d never had my fingers in somebody before, I didn’t know! Maybe I’d broken your maidenhead.”

“My  _ what _ ?”

“You know what I’m talking about.”

“It can’t be that much blood the first time,” she said, then added anxiously, “Can it?”

He shrugged.

“It didn’t hurt, though. Isn’t it supposed to hurt when it breaks?”

“You know more about it than I do.”

“Your fingers are rather long and that was, uh, vigorous,” she said reasonably. “Maybe you did break it and I was enjoying myself too much to notice. We wouldn’t know, would we, since I have my period?”

“Not until we--” he caught himself. “I mean, if you don’t bleed your first time, you can look back and know it was this.”

“Yes, I suppose we’ll know eventually.” She laid her head on his shoulder. “This is not something either of us are likely to forget. It’s one of the more humiliating experiences of my life.”

He shifted so she could snuggle closer to him. “Sorry, why are you humiliated?”

“ _ I got my period on your hand and all over your bed! _ ”

“I’m not bothered. No harm done, now that I realize I haven’t actually hurt you.”

She looked at him with that expression she’d had the other night, so affectionate it warmed his heart. “You’re being wonderful about this, you know that?”

“Yes, well, I was really enjoying myself before, I think you forgave me, and you did just say ‘we’ll know,’ as though our first time is going to be together so that’s encouraging.”

“Of course our first time will be together. Why wouldn’t it be?”

“You said you weren’t having sex for the first time in this tent. We don’t know how long we’ll be on the hunt for Horcruxes. You might be done with me by the time we find them all.”

“I’m not going to be done with you. If anything it’s more likely you’ll be done with me. You’re the one who said we’re not together and that we only fumbling with each other.”

“I thought I was forgiven for that?”

“It wasn’t only the other night, Ron. You can be so kind to me, really the most wonderful person, but since we’ve been in this tent there are times when you seem furious with me for no reason at all.” She traced freckles on his forearm. “There are days when everything I do irritates you. I believe you when you say how you feel, but when you act like that, I wonder if I’m being stupid about this.”

He felt his face get hot. “When I wear the locket, it makes me think horrible things. It’s worse for me than it is for you or Harry.”

“What kind of horrible things?” She sounded worried.

He shook his head. He couldn’t possibly tell her because if he did he’d have to admit how those thoughts crept in even when he wasn’t wearing it, even before he’d ever touched the locket. She wouldn’t want him if she knew the depths of his insecurity. She’d be furious if he told her how often he wondered if she preferred Harry over him. Or worse, she’d admit it, acknowledge that he was her second choice but try to make him feel okay about it, and he couldn’t bear that.

“Things that I know aren’t real most of the time,” he lied. “But when I wear it, I forget.”

She looked at him with concern. “You shouldn’t wear it if it affects you like that.”

“Then you and Harry would be stuck with it even more. I’m not going to be a burden on you.”

“Is that what it makes you think, that you’re a burden?”

He looked away from her. “That and other things.”

“You aren’t,” she insisted, trying to make him look at her. “We couldn’t do this without you.”

“That’s the orgasms talking,” he teased.

“I’m serious, Ron. We need you. I need you.”

He wanted to shrug it off and tease her more but he knew that attempting to do so would only make her more relentless, so he deflected and changed the subject. “It’s really not so bad. I just get a bit grouchy. I’ll try not to take it out on you. Anyway, I better get dressed and you should go back to your bunk. Harry’ll be back soon.”

“We didn’t do anything for you,” she said apologetically.

“It’s all right. When I thought I’d made you bleed everywhere that killed the mood for me. Hand me my shirt, will you?”

She did and he finished dressing as she stayed planted on his bed. “Next time,” she said earnestly. “I’ll do something special for you.”

“You don’t need to. The things we usually do are all I need. If I could have tonight again without the bit where I thought I’d hurt you, I’d be thrilled.”

“Still, I want to show you how much I appreciate you. I’d like to do something so you’ll know how much I care about you.”

“Like what?” he said, stretching.

“I was thinking I could use my mouth next time,” she said shyly.

He stared at her, slack-jawed. “You can’t say things like when we don’t have time to do anything about them.”

She just smiled and climbed up to her bunk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope I didn’t traumatize anyone. But honestly sometimes somebody gets their period unexpectedly! At least they have magic instead of ruined sheets and a nice moment instead of an awkward Tinder date.
> 
> Early update because I'm going out of town for a long weekend but actually might switch to mid-week updates because my weekends are getting busier.


	5. I Did Promise

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More tent adventures! Mostly smut. There's maybe a tiny bit of plot but not much.

Her mouth. Ron could not stop thinking about it the next day. Awful thoughts crept in because he was wearing the locket that day but, as insubstantial as ghosts, they drifted away whenever he looked at her mouth. For example, he thought repeatedly about the fact that he said he loved her and she had not said it back. This was the sort of thing that could haunt him but then she smiled or licked her lips and he thought of what she’d offered and everything else in the world was erased.

He found himself so fixated on this that he was even more useless than he usually was when he was wearing the locket. He was no help gathering firewood or fetching water or finding food. But he also wasn’t grumpy so the others didn’t say anything. As the sun set, Harry took the locket from him without a word and Ron realized that he hadn’t spoken to Harry at all that day. He had almost forgotten about him.

He couldn’t explain why the promise of a blow job was affecting so much more strongly than any of the other incredible things they had done or said. He considered the possibility that maybe it wasn’t actually that. Maybe it was that she’d been more sympathetic about his reactions to the locket than he’d thought she would be. Maybe it was feeling her from the inside as she came on his fingers. Maybe it was that he’d told her he loved her, even though she hadn’t said it back.

No, it was that, even in his wildest fantasies, he had not considered Hermione as the sort of person who, unprompted, offered to suck him off. Before they’d started all of this, when he thought seriously about what would happen if he asked he out, he’d imagined she either would not be interested in him or, if she was, it would all move very slowly. He assumed that every new thing they tried would come at his suggestion; she might permit him to do things but express no desires of her own. But he realized suddenly that the opposite had been true. She had started the whole thing by talking about fantasies with him, saying she wanted him, touching herself in his presence. She’d kissed him first. So much of it all came about at her suggestion, because she said what she wanted, and he found it reassuring and, maybe more than anything, arousing.

Ron had first watch that night. He got back from watch a few minutes early, hustled a disgruntled Harry out of bed and out of the tent, and then bounded up to Hermione’s bunk. Ron kissed her awake.

“Mmm, that’s nice,” she murmured. She opened her mouth to say something when they heard the tent flaps rustle.

“It’s freezing,” Harry muttered. “You could have warned me. I’m borrowing your jacket, Ron.” 

Ron, motionless, said nothing.

“Asleep already?” Harry grumbled and left again. Ron and Hermione stayed stock still until they heard Harry’s footsteps retreat.

“You didn’t wait until you were sure he was gone?” she hissed.

“Over eager,” Ron said apologetically. “But at least I left all the lights off.”

“All because I offered to--?” she said, sounding both exasperated and amused.

“Yes.”

She sighed dramatically. “Let’s go to your bunk. I’m not sure how we’ll need to arrange ourselves and I’m not keen to dangle my legs off this bed.”

He practically hopped down and started stripping his clothes off. Right now! She was going to do it right now! He lit a small flame and floated it nearby so he could see. After they were in his bunk and kissing, she conjured a hair tie and pulled her hair back into a ponytail.

“I’ve never seen you wear your hair like that,” he said. “You wear it up sometimes but usually it’s everywhere. Which I really like by the way,” he added quickly at her narrowed eyes.

“I’m not having it get in my face while I do this.”

“Fucking hell, you are serious about this, aren’t you?”

“I did promise,” she said with a wry smile.

“After this I’m going to make you come until you pass out.”

“But I’ve still got my period.”

“So? You had it last night and I got you off twice.”

“There was blood everywhere!”

“We cleaned it up.”

“I am not bleeding on your bed again.”

“Well, you’ve got a, uh, tampon in or something?” 

She blushed and nodded. 

“So that won’t be a problem, right? No blood on the bed, orgasms for all.”

“We’ll see,” she said skeptically. She knelt in front of his bed. “Come here.”

“You’ve still got all your clothes on,” he complained. “I haven’t gotten to play with you at all.”

“Am I a toy?” she asked reproachfully.

“Yes,” he said without thinking.

She swatted at his thigh but smiled. “Get over here.”

It was the bossy tone that did it. He moved so he was sitting on his bed, his long legs planted on the ground with her between them. He had to stoop to avoid hitting his head on the underside of the bunk above him. Completely naked, he felt slightly ridiculous. But she was kissing his stomach and touching him and soon he forgot about anything other than the impending promise of her mouth.

Hermione looked at his sizable erection inches from her face. She felt determined, curious, and excited. Gingerly, she kissed the head. He nodded in an encouraging way. She opened her mouth wide and took in as much of him as she could, gagging herself in the process. It seemed deep throating was not going to work for her. Instead, she put a hand around his shaft and moved it the way he liked while she experimented with her mouth. She licked and sucked and studied his reactions. She liked how helpless and overcome with pleasure he appeared. Quickly she found a rhythm that made him let out a stream of swear words--always a good sign--and bobbed her head up and down as he gripped her ponytail.

She rested her free hand on his thigh, gripped his waist, ran her fingers over the trail of coppery hair on his stomach. After a few minutes he took her hand and interlaced his fingers with hers. Hermione found this oddly touching. They had held hands before, of course. It reminded her of that first night at Grimmauld Place when they fell asleep holding hands. It was so sweet, so intimate, that she melted a little. Then it occurred to her that holding hands was not all that intimate compared to having his cock in her mouth, which almost made her laugh. She smiled up at him.

“Hermione,” he breathed.

She ran her tongue over his tip, swirled it over the slit, sucked, moved her hand faster, and in no time he was emptying into her mouth and pulling hard her hair. It tasted salty and strange but also sort of wonderful. She swallowed down his cum, all of it, then let him fall away from her lips. She wiped her mouth daintily with her fingertips.

“Merlin’s fucking pants,” he panted. “Hermione, how did you learn to do that?”

She climbed in next to him on his bed. “I read about it. Muggle women’s magazines mostly. They have a lot of advice on the subject.”

“Clever, those Muggles,” he said, and she thought he sounded so much like his father just then that it made her heart swell. Poor Ron, she thought. For the first time in his life he didn’t have someone from his family down the hall; he was cut off from them and they were in danger. She felt an overwhelming sort of tenderness for him.

He collapsed onto his pillow and pulled her down beside him, wrapping his arms around her. “You swallowed,” he said, sounding awed.

“Should I not have?” she said, slightly worried.

“No! I loved it.”

“I did too, actually.” She grinned at him. He kissed her deeply. She meet his kiss with enthusiasm and straddled him. They tangled limbs and mouths, her clothed and him naked.

“The rest of tonight is for you,” he said into the hollow at the base of her throat.

Hermione grabbed his arm and pulled his wrist close enough to examine his watch. “Are you saying that, subtracting time to get dressed, you want to spend the next three hours and twelve minutes giving me orgasms?”

“Yes, exactly. What do you reckon we can manage in that time? Six? Seven if we don’t bother getting dressed after?”

“We are absolutely getting dressed after. It was bad enough Harry almost caught you in my bed!”

“Why don’t we just tell him?” Ron said, a little unhappily.

Hermione frowned. She could almost hear Harry asking her if this was really such a good idea. That was not something she wanted to deal with, especially as she increasingly concerned that perhaps Ron should stop having a turn with the Horcrux. Convincing Ron and Harry of this without hurting Ron’s pride seemed a more pressing issue than discussing their relationship with Harry.

“You’re going to say no again, aren’t you?” he asked shrewdly.

“Yes, I am. Because I think he’ll say something against it and I don’t want to hear why we shouldn’t. I want to enjoy it and not worry for once,” she said firmly.

He looked at her as if he didn’t quite believe her but didn’t argue. Instead he went back to kissing her and she, happy to shed the stressful topic, kissed him back. Ron peeled off her shirt, her pyjama bottoms and knickers. He kissed all over her bare skin, the inside of her elbows, her knees, a scar on her hip from falling off her bike as a young girl. He touched her everywhere except where she most wanted, teasing her in a way he hadn’t ever before.

“Wasn’t I supposed to be getting an absurd number of orgasms?” she asked as he lay kisses along her belly.

“Are you finally admitting that’s what you want?” he asked, his voice low.

“Yes,” she said after a pause. “I am. Please, Ron.”

He grinned at her playfully. She felt her breath catch in her throat. He moved her so she was in a position much like he had been earlier in the evening, except lying down instead of sitting up. He got on his knees in front of her and draped her legs over his shoulders.

Ron had thought she might express hesitation but she merely suggested he grab a pillow for his knees, which he did. He looked at her there, the different shades of her skin, the beauty of this part of her that only he got to see. He kissed the inside of her thigh and then began exploring with his tongue.

He ran his mouth all over her, kissing gently, before circling around her clit.  Ways to Charm Witches had said to make the alphabet with your tongue so he tried that. When he got to “G” she yanked his hair in a promising way so he did it again and again. Ron sucked on her lightly, then harder, alternate this with licking in the way she had liked. He felt unhurried. He finally had almost enough of her with his face buried there, her legs on him, her hands in his hair, and his own hands cupping her ass and angling her to his lips.

Eventually she dug her heels into his back and her legs tightened around his ears, her thighs rigid and shaking. In his excitement he wanted to do everything harder and faster but he held steady because he knew this was what she needed. She bucked against his mouth and bit her own hand as she came. He did not stop and neither did she, not for what had to be minutes. Her whole body was limp by the time she told him that she could not take more. Even her hand in his hair had gone slack.

Ron kissed his way back up her body to her mouth. She kissed him back, shaking slightly. He pulled the blankets around them.

“Was that more than one?” he asked. “It seemed different than usual, like it went on longer.”

“It was but I stopped counting after three. I couldn’t remember what number went after that,” she said. “Wow.”

“You look like you’ve been confunded,” he said with a laugh.

“I feel like I’ve been.”

He looked at his watch. “And we’ve still got time if you want another go.”

She looked at him with huge eyes, mouth agape. “Are you serious?”

He cupped one of her breasts but she shook her head.

“They’re tender. They always are the first few days of my period.”

“They’re a bit bigger as well,” he mused and moved his hand over her waist, down her hips. He reached between her legs and very lightly touched along her folds. 

She whimpered. “It’s too much,” she said. “I need a minute.”

“Should we have a cuddle then?”

She was quiet a moment before she said, “I would like another round. But in the meantime, I want to do something for you.”

“You already did.”

“Why should we settle for just one for you?” She batted her eyelashes at him.

Ron kissed her. “I’ve got an idea,” he said. He got on top of her and positioned himself kneeling between her legs. She gave him a questioning look. “I’m not going to do what you’re thinking,” he said. “Hold on.” He adjusted and moved a pillow under her so the underside of his shaft pressed along her labia and clit. He looked at her, a question.

“Oh!” she exclaimed. “I’d never thought… Yes, all right.” Then she nodded and he almost laughed at the serious look on her face. He kissed very gently, braced himself on one forearm so he wouldn’t crush her, and started to rub against her while holding his cock in place with his other hand. Hermione put one hand over his and stroked him. She moved her body slowly against him and with her free hand dragged her fingernails along his arm in a way he thought might undo him.

“You’re brilliant,” she marveled. “This is good for both of us.”

“I have my moments. Though you’re going to have to stop in a minute unless you want to come.”

“I don’t want to stop,” she said and wrapped a hand tighter around him. She brought him off quickly, his cum sticky on their stomachs. He sagged onto her and moaned her name.

“You can touch me now,” she said into his hair. Fighting his exhaustion with great effort, he touched her how she liked. Ron could tell by the way she moved against his hand that she was already close. Her hair was falling out of the ponytail, flyaway hairs looking like a halo around her. He kissed her breasts very lightly and listened to her heart and breathing speed up. She looked exceptionally pretty he thought. She caught him staring at her face and smiled, opened her mouth as if to speak, and for a second he was sure she was going to tell him she loved him too. It was the look on her face, affectionate bordering on adoring.

“Ron, I--” she started but then it was lost to her gasping, coming again under his fingers.

After he’d cleaned them up and they were lying naked and holding hands under his blankets, he asked her, “What was it you were going to say before?”

She smiled at him. “I’ll tell you another time.”

He badly wanted her to say it but he didn’t press. If he’d been wrong, if that hadn’t been what she’d intended to say, he didn’t want to know.

“After all that I’m not sure my legs work,” she said. “I feel like all my bones have turned to rubber.”

Ron kissed her cheek. They stayed there, silent and happy, for as long as they could.


	6. Enough

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What will happen when Ron leaves--and when he returns?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one was a little hard to write because it’s kind of a bummer but I couldn't find a way around it. It's also the only non-smutty chapter. I think the next chapter will be the last and I promise it's happier.

Hermione had hoped that she could convince Ron to stop wearing the locket but he wouldn’t hear of it. He stormed away from her at the mere suggestion that they tell Harry about its impact on him and refused to talk about it further. When she offered to simply wear it for him, he claimed she was overreacting.

She wasn’t sure what was worse, the idea that the locket was influencing so severely but he wouldn’t stop wearing it, or his claim that his harshness was not caused by the Horcrux. Over the next few weeks the chasm between his tenderness during the nights together and his behavior the rest of the time became even wider. He grew openly contemptuous of Harry. Increasingly he had unkind words for her as well. It didn’t stop her from going to him every night he’d have her, but it wore on her. They started bickering in a way she hated, snapping and criticizing each other as though unable to stop themselves, with no undercurrent of playfulness or affection. 

One evening it reached a boiling point and he made a comment about how his mother could make a good meal from nothing.  _ His mother _ . She thought of a future like this: a man who would not cook but would negatively compare her cooking to his saintly mother’s. It didn’t matter that he said he loved her. It didn’t matter that, though she didn’t say it, she loved him too. It didn’t matter how much she wanted him. She couldn’t stand it.

Everything after that happened too quickly: arguing, then overhearing the goblins and Ted Tonks and the others, realizing what they needed to find, and the fight between Ron and Harry. Her stomach lurched as she understood that she should have pushed harder about the locket. She shouldn’t have let him keep wearing it when he insisted he could handle it. As she realized this, he and Harry were both shouting, both reaching for wands, and it all got away from her.

Then he was gone.

It was over. Everything she’d wanted for years, it was finished. They’d had six secret weeks of finding each other in the dark and would have nothing else. She and Harry were likely to die on this mission, which stretched on in front of her for what might be years. She could think of no way Ron could return to her and based on what he’d said as he left, he wouldn’t want to.  _ You chose him _ . Was that what he’d been thinking? Even after everything she’d shared with him, that he was her second choice? He’d been jealous of Harry of all people. He’d left stewing in that jealousy and the last time he’d been jealous he took up with Lavender. If she ever did find him again, he’d undoubtedly be with someone else.

Or he’d die. Maybe he’d make it back safe to his parents, to Hogwarts, but even with the trick with the ghoul, he was an obvious target. He might be dead already. Would she even find out what happened to him? 

If he did ever turn back up alive and well, she planned to murder him for making her worry like this.

Mostly Hermione tried not to think of it, her own future or him. She tried to shut it out, to pretend it had never happened, that he had never been there and never left. At night she dreamt of him too often. In her dreams he came back, or it was all a mistake, or he had never left. He kissed her, he was naked and undressing her, he was laughing, he was telling her he loved her and she was telling him that she loved him too and always had. When she woke up from those dreams she always cried, though she tried to hide it from Harry.

Ron’s absence felt heavy between them. She couldn’t tell him the extent of her heartbreak, and he couldn’t say how he felt either. They moved on, ignoring what they couldn’t discuss. She was very glad she’d never told Harry what had happened been her and Ron. There was enough pain between them without him realizing that she’d just lost her first love.

***

 

Ron knew in an instant that he’d fucked up. A potentially life altering fuck up, the scale of which hit him only after he got away the Snatchers. He might never see either of them again. They might die, he might die, the whole wizarding world might fall. Even if he found them again one day, would Harry ever forgive him? Had he lost his best friend? As for Hermione, he knew he’d destroyed any chance of a future with her he’d ever had. He’d heard her calling for him, screaming for him, and hadn’t gone to her. He hadn’t even looked at her. He knew her well enough to know there was no coming back from that. He’d be extremely lucky if she ever tolerated his presence again.

She had wanted him, he knew that once he was away from the locket. She wouldn’t anymore because he’d left, but the time they’d spent together had been real. For a brief moment he’d been with the girl he dreamed of and he’d ruined it all. Ron knew that he was going to miss her for the rest of his life. He’d never been a position before where his failings changed the rest of his life. He supposed that’s what adulthood was: mistakes that could truly damage things beyond repair, repercussions that went on until you died. He was an adult, then.

There was no point in wallowing in it. At least he had his memories. Ron was vaguely comforted by the thought that quite a number of his first experiences had been with Hermione and that was a fact no one could take away from him.

Miraculously, though, after weeks of bumbling around and sitting in Shell Cottage feeling ashamed of himself, he found a way back. Harry was much more forgiving than he expected, and much kinder about what the Horcrux showed them than he’d believed anyone would be. The way Harry reassured him that he cared for Hermione like a sister, that even in Ron’s absence Hermione had not wanted Harry, meant more to him than Harry knew. Ron realized how much he’d missed Harry. He wished that he’d told Harry about all of it months earlier, about what the locket made him think and what he was feeling. He wished he’d turned to his friend instead of away from him.

For one shining second when he saw Hermione he thought she might embrace him. For the next several minutes, he thought she might actually injure him, as she certainly seemed determined to do so. It was soon clear that she’d be very angry at him for a very long time, but he had expected that. He was determined to do all he could to get her to, if not forgive him, then at least not be any angrier than she already was. That was enough for him; he had come back to her, she had accepted that he was there, and he would not ask for more.

Ron thought that in the days that followed she might want to yell at him some more but she ignored and avoided him. After their near-capture at the Lovegood’s that she seemed less irate with him, and sometimes even happy that he was there. 

But a few days after their escape at the Lovegood’s, it was clear that things were not right with Harry. Harry was still talking about the Hallows, brooding about, and disinterested in Ron and Hermione, the Horcrux search, and the mystery of the silver doe. One night while Harry was on first watch and the rain beat down on them relentlessly, Ron approached Hermione where she was reading.

“I want to talk to you,” he said quietly. She looked up, surprised, but did not turn him away. “I’m worried about Harry.”

She put her book aside. “I am too. He seems obsessed with finding the Hallows. It’s like he’s forgotten all about what we’re doing out here.”

“Do you think something’s happened? You-Know-Who’s in his head again, or something went wrong at the Lovegood’s?”

She shook her head. “I think there’s something about the possibility of the Hallows that affects him. You heard him, wanting the resurrection stone, wanting to see his parents and Sirius. It’s like he thinks he could overcome death with the Hallows. As though if he had them, he could be beat You-Know-Who and somehow get back everyone he’s lost.”

“What are we going to?” he whispered.

“Keep leading him in the right direction and hope he snaps out of it, I suppose. I tried to talk to him but we only argued.”

“I did too. He wouldn’t listen to me. He wouldn’t talk to me--really talk I mean--about what he’s thinking or how he’s feeling. He kept saying the same things he’d said before about how Dumbledore meant for him to find the Hallows.”

She looked at him with a familiar expression that could not immediately make sense of. It took him a minute to recognize it as the sort of look she’d sometimes had right before she kissed him or when they lay together in the afterglow. “Hermione,” he murmured, seizing his chance. “I really am sorry. I know how wrong I was to leave and how wrong I was before I left. I’m not asking anything of you, but I want you to know, I still lo--”

“Don’t say it!” she cut him off, almost shouting.

He exhaled slowly. “Whether or not I say it, it’s how I feel. Do you really want to pretend it never happened?”

She looked suddenly very close to tears. “It’s not that. But don’t say it.”

“Why not?” he persisted.

“Because I don’t want you to say it unless I can say it back!” she cried. “I wanted to say it before--so many times, Ron!--but not unless...I only wanted to say it if we’re really together. If you’re my boyfriend, I mean.” She looked away from him.

He felt as though his heart was once again filled with warm, glowing light. “Is that all? We can fix that.” He snapped his fingers. “I’m your boyfriend now, problem solved.”

She laughed a little and looked at him. “You know we can’t.”

“Because I spoilt everything?” he said sadly.

“No! No, not that at all. It destroyed me, when you left. But I didn’t change how I felt about you,” she said, staring into his eyes until he looked away. “That’s not why we can’t be together.”

“Why then?”

“Because all the reasons I said we couldn’t tell Harry haven’t changed. Especially now, when he’s retreating into his obsession with the Hallows, he’s going to take it badly. It’ll be hard for him, you know that.”

Ron knew she was right. Harry would feel even more disconnected from them than he already did. Harry already thought he needed to do everything alone, and this would only separate him further from them. They couldn’t tell Harry, and he didn’t be together and lie to him about it again either.

“I miss you,” Ron said plaintively.

“I miss you too. But that doesn’t change things. We’re not telling Harry, so where does that leave us? I don’t want it to be like it was before, this secret we’re keeping on top of everything else that’s happening. I only want to be with you if I can be glad about it.”

“Can’t we try again? Not now, but after this is all finished?” he asked cautiously.

“I want to, Ron. But until we’re done finding every last Horcrux, until the war is over, I can’t think about it. After we’ve had some time to sort ourselves out and everyone’s safe and I’ve found my parents again, we can see if we both still want to. But not a moment before that. And I’m not promising anything. We don’t know how we’ll feel by the end of all of this.”

“I know how I’ll feel,” he insisted.

“Don’t say that. If you say that now and then you change your mind--you already broke my heart when you left and you’re not allowed to break it again.” Tears spilled down her cheeks. “We don’t know what will happen. I’m not going to spend the rest of our time in this tent daydreaming about a future together and being gutted if we don’t get it. We’re friends, Ron. That’s all we can be right now.”

He reached for her hand but she pulled it away. “Can’t we hold hands? I just want to be close to you again.”

“And then what? We’ll get close and want more. We know why we can’t. I don’t want to say no to you. Please don’t make me.”

“I won’t ask for anything else. You won’t need to say no.”

“But I’ll want more! I’ll want to kiss you, to touch you, to--” She closed her eyes and shook her head. “Do you really want to be in a position to turn me down when I’m asking for something that we both want so badly?”

He felt his own tears threatening to come. “You really do want to be with me?”

She looked at him, stunned. “Of course I do. I always have. You were always the one I wanted. I spent so many years hoping you’d see. When you said I chose Harry, I couldn’t believe you still didn’t know.”

“Know what?” he said, barely audible.

“I always choose you. You’ve always been the one for me.”

“Hermione…”

Hermione wiped her eyes and took a deep breath before continuing. “But right now, we can be friends. I am very glad to be your friend,” she said earnestly. “I am glad you came back.”

“I am too.” He looked at her face very carefully. “I’m glad of what we had, too. Even if it wasn’t a perfect situation, I’m--happy--” His voice broke but he pressed on. “I’m happy I got to share that with you. You’re a gorgeous, amazing person and a fucking genius and anyone you end up with is very lucky. I’m lucky I got to be with you for the time I did.”

She sobbed. “Don’t say things like that! I can’t say no to you when you say things like that.”

“I’m not asking you anything that you need to say no to.”

“Aren’t you?”

It was his turn to look away. “I’m happy we’re friends again, Hermione.”

It was enough, they told themselves. They both thought of a future and tried not to admit this longing. They did not ask each other things that they had agreed not to ask. They did not kiss, did not break the rules they had made for themselves. They were both quietly hopeful. They waited.

It was enough.


	7. Afterward

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Complete! Finally, a happy ending. Thanks for reading!

One of the great joys of Ron’s life was that it was Hermione who broke the rule she’d set out. She did, after all, kiss him mid-battle, which was something she had said was not allowed. For the first time in months and months, he got to kiss her again, and it was as if the sun had come out after a very long storm. There was no more maybe about it. In that kiss, it was decided. They would be together in earnest, they would see what the future held for them, and they would not hide it.

Her kissing him before they supposed to also meant that he would get to tease her about failing to uphold their agreement. In the lifetime that followed, he did tease her about this many times, but only in private and only when he was looking for a swat on the bum. 

That came much later though.

Before a lifetime of teasing, first things were complicated, as they always are. After the battle, he had a brother to mourn, she had to find her parents, and they both had a lot of healing to do. They were together, but more innocently and also more tenderly than either had expected based on their history.

In the first months after the Battle of Hogwarts, Hermione thought that she and Ron had conducted their relationship all out of order. They had spent years getting to know one another, had a brief, whirlwind bout of sexual exploration, followed that with months of mutually acknowledged affection and unacted upon attraction in highly emotional situations, and finally, they were dating, kissing, cuddling, and holding hands. But not much more than that. 

They kept things much more chaste in the early days of dating than they had in their time in the tent. She didn’t want to rush him while he was still in the thick of grief. There was also the wrinkle that, when she returned from Australia with her parents, Mr. and Mrs. Weasley announced a rule (as much for Ginny and Harry as for her and Ron) that no one was to be behind a closed door with their boyfriend or girlfriend. Hermione’s parents thought this was an excellent idea and adopted it as well. Despite a fiery argument between Weasley parents and children, the rule was enforced with vigor, and for several weeks Ron didn’t suggest trying to circumvent it so she didn’t either. 

As much as she missed what they’d shared months earlier, she also appreciated the relationship for what it was. She was grateful to be close to him once more, to kiss him, to spend lazy summer days reading while he rested his head in her lap and alternately dozed and tried to distract her. They had sweet moments instead of searing ones. The day she told him she loved him was the happiest she’d seen him look in months. Once she finally said it, she found the words spilling out of her so often that she worried he’d get tired of hearing it. He didn’t.

It wasn’t until a hot July day that either of them admitted to wanting more than loving embraces. They were in Ron’s room, door open as per the house rule, kissing on his bed. Because anyone in the family could walk by, they normally kept it quite tame, but when no one did walk by for a long time, they found themselves getting bolder. Ron kissed her neck. She pulled his hair a little. Hermione felt herself getting aroused in the needy way she had been with him in the past. She debated saying something, asking him to take her somewhere they could be alone, when Mrs. Weasley appeared silently at the doorway with a tower of laundry.

“Hello,” she said crisply and Ron and Hermione leapt apart.

“Mum!” Ron yelped. “You can’t sneak up like that!”

“Don’t do anything you wouldn’t want your mother to see,” Mrs. Weasley told him primly as she started making his clean laundry fly into his drawers.

“This is ridiculous! Ridiculous! We destroyed Horcruxes, we’re war heroes, we deserve a bit of privacy!” he ranted.

“Not in my house, you don’t.”

He groaned. “Just leave the laundry, Mum. I’ll put it away.”

“I’d like to see that.”

“I’ll do it, just go.”

She raised her eyebrows and gave him a look.

“Thank you for the laundry,” he said, annoyed, to her glare.

“I’ll be back in a minute so you better actually put it away, and don’t get any ideas.”

As they heard her tramp back down the stairs, he put the rest of his clothes away with a few waves of his wand. “Never thought I’d say this but sometimes I miss that fucking tent.”

“God, me too,” Hermione sighed. 

He looked at her, an expression she knew from their nights together, a look that he often had right before he undressed her.

“Anything in particular you miss?” he asked in a tone she had missed immensely.

She said, very softly and very close to his ear, “Remember that night you gave me something like five orgasms?”

“My goal had been seven though. Didn’t quite make it,” he said, licking his lips.

“You might have. I stopped counting, remember?”

“That was such a good night.”

A moment later, Mrs. Weasley appeared again, so the subject was dropped.

A few days after that Ron told Hermione he was taking her on a picnic. They went to a very quiet, very empty meadow, where Ron laid out a blanket. Hermione reached in the basket he’d brought and discovered it empty.

“Ron, you haven’t brought any food,” she said, exasperated.

He stretched out on the blanket. “Guess I’ll have to eat you then,” he said, sounding as though he’d try to laugh it off if she said no. Sounding, she thought, a little nervous.

She considered him for a moment, then slipped her knickers off under her sundress and tossed them at him. “Finally,” she said and kissed him.

He said, his voice low, “I’ve really missed you.”

“I’ve missed you too. Now,” she said, adopting the tone he liked, “aren’t you supposed to be doing something?”

He kissed her neck. “We’re going on a lot of picnics for the rest of the summer.”

“I certainly hope so.”

Picnics and other creative solutions served reasonably well for reestablishing what they’d explored before. It wasn’t exactly the unhurried hours that either of them wanted with each other, but it was better than it had been in the tent, just as passionate yet much less fraught. As the summer came to a close, Hermione broached the subject of what they had not tried thus far, what had been off limits previously but was no longer.

Ron was, not surprisingly, eager to cross the line that had remained uncrossed, but there were practical considerations. A contraceptive spell was simple enough, but they agreed that the setting ought to be a bit nicer than, well, a field, which presented difficulties that they did not resolve before she returned to Hogwarts with Ginny for a final year of education. He and Harry began Auror training soon after and got a flat, and he and Hermione wrote letters that included many hopeful references to what they might do in his private room behind a locked door when they had the opportunity.

She found it strange being at Hogwarts without him or Harry. She and Ron wrote each other often--more often than she’d thought Ron inclined to write anybody, in fact--and they were both busy with their endeavors. But they were also both lonely for each other’s company.

On the first Hogsmeade weekend of the school year Ron and Harry meet Hermione and Ginny in town. The plan had originally been to Disapparate together to his flat, but because of security concerns about Death Eaters still at large, Hogwarts students were strictly forbidden to leave Hogsmeade on their weekend visits at risk of future visits being cancelled for the rest of the year. 

While they had a lovely time walking around the town together, especially after Harry and Ginny went off to do something Ron was determined to ignore, it wasn’t exactly what either of them had wanted. Hermione quietly suggested they get a room for the afternoon at the The Three Broomsticks or Hog’s Head but Ron shook his head.

“You said you wanted it to be special,” he said. “And a couple of hours in a room over a pub isn’t that.”

“Who knew you were such a romantic?” she said fondly, making his ears turn an especially vibrant red.

“I have something planned for winter holidays,” he murmured. “It’s a surprise.”

She looked intrigued but he said nothing more about it. He did, however, agree that a room wasn’t a bad idea for the remainder of the afternoon to acquaint themselves with the things they had already done many, many times before. They agreed afterward that this had been a very good decision.

When winter holidays began, Ron met Hermione at King’s Cross Station. Harry and Mrs. Weasley were also there to meet Ginny, who very plainly would have rather met her boyfriend without her mother and brother present. Thanks to an elaborate set of lies told to both their families, and with the generous assistance of Harry and Ginny’s participation in said lies, Ron and Hermione were able to slip off alone after a brief chat with the others. Hermione’s parents for their part were not expecting her for another day, when she would join them at home.

“Do you feel at all bad lying to everyone?” Hermione asked anxiously as they left the station.

“Not even a little. One day with you all to myself isn’t going to do anybody any harm. We wouldn’t need to lie if our families would leave us alone. We’re adults, we should be allowed to close bedroom doors.”

“I suppose you’re right. Are we going to your flat now?”

He shook his head. “I’ve got a surprise for you. If you hate it we’ll go back to mine, but I did tell Harry we’d probably be gone until tomorrow. He’s hoping to have the place to himself.”

“Oh, that’s why Ginny was so eager to help--”

“Let’s not talk about that. Ready?” He held out his arm for side-along Apparition. She took it and in a moment they were in a familiar, snowy forest they knew from both the World Cup and their earliest days on the run, looking at a tent.

Hermione burst out laughing. “Seriously?”

“Look, I know you said, you know, not in a tent, but everything else we’re done for the first time has been in a tent. It’s a new one, a lot nicer, and there’s food. I cooked! My mum’s been teaching me. Harry’s rubbish at household spells, did you know? The Chosen One and all that but his cooking is shite. I should warn Ginny.”

He was jittery and rambling, endearingly nervous. She took his hand and together they walked into the tent, which was smaller and much better smelling than the one they’d shared for so long. Instead of bunk beds there was a single very large, very inviting bed. On the whole though it was not too much different, which she found comforting. She’d also missed it a little.

“Is it all right?” Ron asked hesitantly.

“It’s perfect,” she said, and kissed him.

He exhaled in relief. “I’ll put up some protections then, keep Muggles away and everything. You relax.”

“I’ll do it.” She bustled out of the tent, quickly performed the necessary spells, and was back inside before he’d finished getting his trainers off.

“Thank you for this,” she said. She took off her own shoes and sat next to him on the bed. He opened his mouth as if to speak but she kissed him before he could. They had nearly a full day before they had to be anywhere. There was no one else around. This luxury of time was unprecedented for them. What an incredible thing to kiss with no thought to the hour, to undress each other and touch at a leisurely pace. They rolled around, everything both familiar and thrilling at the same time, with no comment to what they planned to do later.

The sun was setting by the time either of them voiced a desire for more. “I think I’m ready,” she whispered.

He kissed her and, to her surprise, started making slow circles around her clit with his fingers. “I’m going to bring you off first,” he explained. “Maybe a few times. We have all night after all.”

Hermione nodded and let herself sink into the wonderful feeling of his touch. After she came, he kissed his way down her body until his face was buried between her legs. He teased her with his mouth, carefully avoiding where she was over sensitive, while he glided two fingers in and out of her opening. When she begged for the teasing to stop, he licked her clit and sucked  it lightly.

She felt herself almost floating with pleasure. For months she’d been fantasizing about him sliding inside her and, as she rocked closer to more orgasms, that fantasy appeared in her mind again. A fantasy she could finally realize, it occurred to her. She whimpered, “Stop, stop, come here.”

He lifted his head and looked bemused.

“Come up here,” she pleaded. 

“But you’re getting close.”

“You’re still such a gentleman,” she said, smiling.

“I like bringing you off.” He kissed the inside of her thigh. “It makes me happy.”

“I think you’d also be happy if you were inside me right now.” 

He stared her a minute, uncertain. “Are you sure?”

“Yes,” she insisted. Ron moved on top of her, kissed her, and she tasted herself on his lips. She rolled him onto his back, took his cock in her mouth and licked sloppily for a few minutes until he was rock hard and slick with her salvia. Then she straddled him, the head of his angled against her but not yet inside.

Ron reached up and held her face in both his hands. “I love you,” he said insistently.

“I love you too.” She bit her lip and together they positioned the tip of him into her. She grimaced at the intensity of the sensation.

“Did I hurt you?” he asked. “We can stop. We don’t have to--”

She shook her head, still frowning. “I want to.” Hermione took a deep, fortifying breath. She tried to consciously relax, to release the tension in her body. This eased the discomfort. It wasn’t painful after the initial push, just new, unfamiliar. Slowly she enveloped him, inch by inch, until she’d taken him completely.

“Oh my God,” he gasped when she did. It occurred to him that, despite some months trying to build up his stamina when he was alone, he was not going to last terribly long. He became especially aware of this fact as she started rocking and bouncing on him. He reached down to touch her clit--he could at least try to bring her off in however long he managed to hold on--but the angle wasn’t good.

“I’ll do it,” she panted and started touching herself. He marveled at this sight in the pale light of a single flame: the woman he loved, touching herself while moaning and writhing on him. He had to close his eyes and rank the most embarrassing Chudley Cannons losses to hold it together. But a few minutes later even that wasn’t helping.

“I can’t last much longer,” he said.

“One more minute,” she cried, moving her hand and her body faster. “You got me so close with your mouth, I’m almost…”

She trailed off. The look of concentration on her face was gorgeous and then it broke to expose something even better. She was louder than usual, though it occurred to him that this might be because they were truly alone for once. He could feel her orgasm around him, the hot core of her squeezing him. A moment later he was lost to it as well, spilling into her. She fell onto his chest, her hair getting into his eyes and mouth. They stayed there a moment, silent.

Then she looked at him and giggled. He laughed too, relieved. “You all right?” he asked, smiling at her as they separated.

“Brilliant. What about you?” she said breathlessly.

He felt dazzled. That such a thing had happened, no matter how much they’d discussed it beforehand, seemed almost unbelievable. “I’m happy,” he said.

“Me too.” She kissed him on the cheek. He thought of the time, many years earlier, she’d kissed him on the cheek before a Quidditch match and he’d found himself mesmerized.

“You know what I’m thinking?” she asked him.

“That you want dinner? I’m starving,” he said, giving her a squeeze.

“You’re always starving.” She got up and stretched. “No, what I was thinking is, do all your freckles still belong to me?”

He’d forgotten about that and was glad to be reminded. “Every single one.”

“Good. Maybe sometime tonight I’ll finally finishing kissing them all.” She beamed at him. “I’m going to the loo.”

“I’m getting us dinner,” he called after her and she offered vague agreement.

He hopped out of bed, pulled on his boxers, and headed to little kitchen. Ron started getting the food ready. He imagined a life of this, all manner of sex with Hermione and followed by food. It sounded perfect.

She returned from the bathroom. “I did bleed a little,” she mused and pushed back the covers. “Nothing too dramatic though, thank God.”

“I’ll do that,” he said as she pulled out her wand to tidy up.

“Already done,” she said. She put on his t-shirt, which was a short dress on her. He amended his fantasy: all manner of sex with Hermione, followed by food while she wore his shirt. She smiled at him.

“Thank you for cooking. You’re such a good boyfriend.”

“I try.” He finished getting their food ready.

She sat on a wooden chair and said idly, “Next round you can tell me what to do and I’ll say nothing but ‘Yes, Ron.’”

He turned and goggled at her, incredulous. 

She shrugged and said, “We have all night. Aren’t we going to--”

“It’s not that. It’s you saying nothing but ‘yes’ to me.”

“You said it was a fantasy and it’s one we’ve never done. It sounds like fun.”

He stared at her for a minute and marveled, “To think this all started because I was yelling about wanking.”

She looked at him with such tenderness and love that he was tempted to look away--it was overwhelming--but he kept his eyes locked on hers. “It was going to happen no matter what,” she said.

“What are you saying, it’s fate?”

Hermione shook her head, her messy curls flying around her face. “Not that. We’ve both wanted this for a very long time. We’ve both cared about each other for a very long time. One way or another, we were going to find our way to each other.”

She said this with so much conviction that it sounded like a fact she’d read. He didn’t agree--he could see dozens of versions of things in which they never got it together or they made an impossible mess of it--but her faith in the pair of them meant the world to him.

“What’s for dinner?” she asked.

“A pile of mushrooms,” he joked.

Hermione smiled at him. “Not my favorite but since you made it, I’m sure I’ll love it.”

He grinned back at her. “You’re not rolling your eyes? Not even an ‘Oh honestly, Ron’? You’re hopelessly in love with me.”

“I am but that can’t be news to you at this point.”

“It’s not really but I can still do with some reminders.”

“Yes, Ron. I’m hopelessly in love with you.”

“Good.” He brought their plates to the table. “I left my wand on the counter. Can you get us some water? And forks?”

“Yes, Ron.” She waved her wand and gathered the things they needed.

“Oh, are we starting that now?”

“Yes, Ron.”

“Hold on, let’s have dinner first.”

“Yes, Ron.”

Through a large mouthful of food he said, “I don’t think you’re really going to follow through on this.”

“Why wouldn’t I?” she said, irritated.

“See, you stopped already!”

“Well, you said we should have dinner first.” She took a bite. “This is delicious.”

“Thanks,” he said modestly, but she could tell he was proud of himself.

“We can establish some ground rules.”

“I knew you wouldn’t really--”

“--And then once we actually get started, I won’t say anything else.”

He raised his eyebrows. “All right. What ground rules?”

“It has to stay in the tent. You can’t tell me to, I don’t know, be naked in a crowded square or something.”

“I don’t want you naked in front of other people! I want you all to myself.”

She smiled. “That was just an example.”

“Fine, in the tent. Anything else?”

“It has to be something we can do tonight, not some future promise you’ll try to hold me to.”

“Sure.”

“Anything we’ve done before, you can go ahead with.”

“Really?”

Hermione nodded. “If it’s something we’ve never done before, you can ask first. If I really don’t want to do or if it hurts, I’ll tell you, but I’ll try to give it a chance.”

Ron found this highly unlikely. “Anything at all? What if it’s really weird?”

“What do you want to do that’s so weird?”

He struggled to come up with something that might shock her into admitting she wouldn’t follow through with this idea but that he wouldn’t mind doing just in case he was wrong. “I’ll...tie you up.”

She considered this as she chewed. “All right then.”

“Just like that?”

“Yes, Ron.”

He narrowed his eyes. “I’ll pull you over my lap and spank you.”

She didn’t hestitate this time when she agreed.

“Hermione!”

“Why do you sound shocked? It’s your idea!”

“You aren’t putting any other limits on this offer? It doesn’t seem like you.”

Hermione lay a hand over his. “I trust you. I know you wouldn’t do something that would hurt me. Everything you do makes me feel good. If you want to try something, I’ll try it.”

He laced his fingers through hers. “Hermione, there’s one more thing I want to ask you, then.”

“Anything.”

“Well, it’s not something we can do in this tent, and it’s a future promise. I know you said no to that, but I’m going to ask you anyway.”

She looked slightly exasperated but didn’t say anything.

“Hermione, will you marry me?”

She gasped and squeezed his hand. After a second she said, “Yes, Ron.”

He beamed at her. “Glad that’s settled then.”

“Did you plan this?”

“How could I plan this? You’re the one who brought up the game.”

“I mean, did you plan to ask me tonight?”

He shook his head. “I would have made it more romantic. Sorry, it just sort of...slipped out.”

“I’m glad you said it. We’re engaged! We should celebrate,” she said, her eyes welling up with happy tears.

Ron pushed his plate aside. “I’ve got an idea or two.”

She blushed. “Shall we get started then?”

“You ready?”

She kissed him on the cheek. “Yes, Ron.”

This was not the story they ever told people about their engagement, of course, but that was true of a lot of things.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! I haven't written fanfic in YEARS. I normally write original fiction but I've been a little blocked. I’m rereading Harry Potter and all of a sudden I ship Romione and needed to write this. I'll try to update once a week.


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